


Birds of a Feather

by AlexiaBlackbriar13, thatmasquedgirl



Series: Flying High [2]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Wings, Anxiety Attacks, Delirious Snuggling, Denial of Feelings, F/M, It would be spoilers to reveal anything else, Masque and Lexi's crazy AU obsession, Nesting, Nightmares, Oliver Queen Has PTSD, POV Felicity Smoak, Panic Attacks, Past Abuse, Past Character Death, Sexual Tension, Sharing a Bed, Some Humor, We hope you enjoy your stay, Welcome back to the madness, Wing Grooming, Winged Oliver Queen, Wingfic, Wings, preening
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-09
Updated: 2017-09-01
Packaged: 2018-12-10 10:20:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 43,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11689617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AlexiaBlackbriar13/pseuds/AlexiaBlackbriar13, https://archiveofourown.org/users/thatmasquedgirl/pseuds/thatmasquedgirl
Summary: Oliver's biology leads to strange new changes for the team.A continuation ofCrash Landing, this time with protein shakes, delirious snuggling, a truck ton of feathers, and enough sexual tension to power a small Midwestern city.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, all! Welcome to an exciting new set of adventures in the _Flying High_ universe! :) I'm really stoked to be experiencing this with you, but before we begin, a few quick words:
> 
> The idea for Flying High came to me because a very dear friend of mine wrote something beautiful, eloquent, and poignant. While I certainly never could top it, the subject matter--a winged crusader in Starling City--inspired my inner muse. So I decided to take my own direction with it and see what happened. That result was _Crash Landing._
> 
> Several months ago, that same friend who inspired it approached me with an idea for a universe I hadn't touched in over a year. I was so honored that I inspired her the way she inspired me, so of course I leapt at the idea, and I was not disappointed.
> 
> This work is completely the creation of AlexiaBlackbriar13's amazing mind. For those of you who don't know Lexi, she's one of the finest writers in this fandom. Some of her finest work is writing science fiction of this magnitude: creating unique biology. In this work in particular, she absolutely shines, and I could not be more excited for the end result. It is with great pleasure I present her contribution to this universe, "Birds of a Feather."
> 
> With love,  
> Masque
> 
>    
>  _Wow, okay. This is Lexi. I'm literally so excited to post this fic. I approached Masque... maybe at the beginning of March? with the ideas for this fic, and it's been an absolute honour to be able to write in Masque's Flying High 'verse, as it's definitely one of my favourites. I've had an incredible few months writing and completing this fic, and Masque has been with me every step of the way - even willing to put up with me frantically chucking drafts at her at 2am._
> 
>  
> 
> _So thank you so much, Masque. For letting me write this and for being so incredibly supportive, lovely and just overall such a wonderful human being. Thank you to Marian, Holly, Calli, Muriel and Ale as well for putting up with me spamming them on the group chats and PMs about this fic and for answering all my Americanism questions. And a massive thank you to Becky (@nvwhovian) for beta-ing! I hope you all enjoy! Lexi x_

* * *

* * *

“Reckless. Irresponsible. Impulsive. Ignorant, mindless -”

“Are you done?”

Felicity turns and shoots Oliver a scornful look at his exasperated tone, pausing in her pacing across the Foundry. She _warned_ him that this would happen. It’s barely a month after she found him injured, bleeding and flightless and Oliver has healed, but not completely. He still finds it difficult to fly and move around too quickly. So, when he insisted on heading out into the city that night to perform Hood duties, Felicity _told_ him it was too soon. And it had been. Oliver arrived back, ashy grey feathers ruffled and wings bristling, with blood dripping from a bullet wound in his side. A _brush_ , he called it. The bullet clipped him, but it hasn’t hit any major blood vessels. He persists in informing Diggle and Felicity that he’s fine, but the IT girl can tell he isn’t.

Concern mars her brow as she slowly moves back towards the winged vigilante, observing him quietly as Oliver is patched up by Diggle. He squirms in his seat, scowling as they fuss over him. The massive wings twitch behind his back, and Felicity sweeps her gaze over them, admiring for a brief moment how the white coverts at the top of the wings, near the wrists, darkens down into a grey gradient, before the tips are coloured a stark midnight black. The vigilante grumbling causes her to raise her eyes up to his face again, and she frowns.

Oliver looks tired. He’s been looking tired for days now, and she originally thought it was because he’s back training again, preparing to get back onto the streets. But no, she can tell now that this is a deeper exhaustion, something that has been plaguing him for a while. She’s been watching him closely over the last few days, and it’s easy now to see that something is, in fact, wrong with Oliver. Maybe he’s ill. Maybe he’s just overworked. But whatever it is, she doesn’t like the way that it causes black bags under his eyes, his shoulders to slump and feathers to droop. It isn’t healthy, and just seeing it all presented in front of her now is causing a lump of anxiety to form in her throat, forcing her to swallow.

“I told you it was stupid,” she whispers, flicking her finger into his bare arm, and drawing back when he gives a slight flinch, throwing her a wary glance.

Sighing, he fixes his intense blue gaze onto the floor, kicking his legs back and forth as he shifts uncomfortably on the gurney. “And I admit, you were right,” Oliver grumbles. His huge wings still bristle slightly, white feathers gleaming, highlighted in the sharp light of a medical lamp. Diggle has to sidestep them to avoid getting hit by the occasional sporadic flap he gives. “But I don’t regret going out there. I took down three criminal one-percenters tonight that have been embezzling funds from charities supporting the Glades. It was worth it.” Softening his voice, he adds tenderly in that tone he reserves for her, and only her, “You understand that, don’t you?”

Okay, he has a point there. Oliver’s work truly is creating a positive change in Starling City, and Felicity has to give him his due, because she knows he is significantly altering thousands of people’s lives for the better. But she can’t help but worry about him. Before she can say anything else, however, Diggle steps around to the other side so he’s in front of the winged crusader, getting in between Oliver and Felicity so they have to break eye contact.

“It needs a few stitches,” Diggle says, somewhat apologetically.

He reaches for the first aid kit and begins threading a needle with one hand like a professional, whilst his other keeps a piece of gauze firmly placed on the wound. Felicity flits forwards and taps his hand, giving him a small smile to say she can take over for him. She flushes as soon as she presses the bandage into Oliver’s side and the vigilante jumps, gaze flitting down to aim very ardent, cobalt eyes at her.

Diggle sighs. “I can’t give you any local because of your metabolism, and the fact that your air sacs are still healing.”

“Do it without,” Oliver shrugs.

“Are you sure? This is going to hurt.”

“Do it without,” he repeats, and when a troubled expression crosses Felicity’s face, he leans in and murmurs softly, “Felicity, it’s fine. It’s just a few stitches.” Mirth sparkles in his eyes as he finishes teasingly, “You can hold my hand if you like.”

She rolls her eyes at him, but still allows a smile to quirk at her lips in amusement, reaching out to squeeze lightly on his shoulder before pulling away, letting Diggle tend to the wound. Oliver has opened up to her and Diggle in ways Felicity never thought he would over the last few weeks. Although Oliver still remains the gruff, suspicious, hesitant individual that had confronted her on QC’s executive floor, Felicity can now see what an absolute wonder he is at heart.

He likes to touch affectionately, probably because he was severely touch starved in the past. Felicity certainly isn’t complaining, however; thrill flashes through her whenever Oliver brushes his wings up against her side in a kind-hearted motion, or whenever he carefully settles his hands on her shoulders. He has this trick where he rubs his thumb gently into her neck to relieve the tension there, and Felicity swears she could kiss him for it. He still speaks harshly, sometimes turning cold and stony towards them if he is pushed too far, or doesn’t like what they are discussing, but Oliver’s true voice that he’s began using with both Felicity and Diggle is low and warm, like melted dark chocolate or a big cat’s rumbling purr. So when he teases her to hold his hand - she does. But not for too long, otherwise he’ll get uncomfortable, and Felicity respects his boundaries.

She doesn’t notice that Diggle is stitching the wound and Oliver’s gritting his teeth with his eyes closed until a single, lithe, feathery finger inches around her open palm to curl around her hand. It makes her jump with a squeak, and then Felicity’s eyes flash down to look at what that finger is and _it’s Oliver’s wing_.

There’s a tiny, white feathery thing wrapped around her fingers, and it’s Oliver’s wing holding her hand. She’s so astonished for a moment that she freezes, not moving, but before she can yank her hand back in shock, that feathered finger tightens and Oliver releases a deep pained sound.

He’s tensed, breathing heavily, and his left wing twitching anxiously. It’s his right wing that has extended out and wrapped around Felicity’s hand, and the realisation strikes her directly in the chest, making her exhale with a whoosh. Oliver is in pain, but he doesn’t know how to ask for comfort. He’s reaching out for her to soothe him instinctively.

Sweeping back towards him, Felicity keeps a firm hold of Oliver’s feathered finger whilst her free hand snakes over his shoulder to gently trace circles in the space between where the two wings are attached. At first, he straightens, snapping upright with a low gasp, and Felicity winces, afraid that he’s going to pull away - but then Oliver’s eyes flutter shut and he relaxes, leaning into her touch. Diggle’s just finishing up the stitches, watching them both with such an impassive expression that Felicity knows that he definitely has an opinion on this, and it makes her blush. She bites her lip as she decides to instead fixate her gaze on that feathered finger hooked around her hand.

“It’s an alula.”

She glances up, taking in Oliver’s scrunched up face and closed eyes. How he knows what she’s going to ask before she even opens her mouth to speak still amazes her. “An alula?” she repeats, twisting her hand within the alula’s grip so she can gently run her fingers down the light grey, white-ish feathers there. “What is it? Like a wing finger?”

“Exactly,” Oliver nods, managing a tight smile. “A wing _thumb_ , actually. All birds have them. One on each wing. Our wings are essentially feathered arms, you know.”

The talking seems to be distracting him from the pain, so Felicity quickly draws him into conversation, saying disbelievingly, “I can’t believe that I never knew that birds have thumbs.”

“You wouldn’t know if you’ve never looked. I flare them out when I fly, they help coordinate with my tertials so I can steer properly without a tail. Birds can’t usually use their alulas to hold onto things, but - well...” A somewhat smug look passes over him, and he preens, left wing half flaring and very nearly smacking an annoyed Dig in the face. “I’m not a bird.”

“That’s genius.” She rubs the pad of her finger down the thick white feathers that line the finger, but goes completely still, breath catching in her throat, when one of the feathers comes loose and falls into her palm. Oh god. Is this meant to happen? Has she just accidentally pulled one of Oliver’s feathers out without even realising it? He just said he needs them for steering - has she just crippled him?! “Uh… Oliver?”

“Hmm?” He raises his head to survey her, and then when he sees the feather in her palm, he goes rigid. He stares down at the feather, a whole mixture of emotions flickering over his face. The fact that he goes motionless must startle Diggle as well, because his partner pauses in his wiping the wound with antiseptic, blinking. Felicity peers back at Oliver with wide eyes as he struggles to find words.

“Your feather fell out,” Felicity says, although she internally berates herself because yes, that is rather obvious. She’s holding the feather in her hand, it’s very obviously not attached to his wing.

Oliver stares at it for a moment, and then he moves so quickly that Felicity has to blink several times, and Diggle has to draw back to avoid accidentally stabbing him with the needle. Felicity’s heart aches and her legs feel numb as she watches Oliver desperately rake his hand through the feathers on his right wing. His blank expression as several of his peppered grey primary coverts fall out chills her to the bone, but nothing is more alarming than the tiny, frightened, “Oh,” he emits, swallowing.

“Oliver?” Diggle asks, taking a cautious step backwards just in case the winged vigilante reacts violently, because he looks shaken to the core.

“They’re - they’re falling out?” Oliver finally questions, his voice strained.

Oh god, this is bad. His reaction is bad. She HAS just crippled him. Trembling, Felicity whispers, “Oliver, I - I am _SO_ sorry, I didn’t -”

“Hey, Felicity, no, this -” His hand darts out to grasp her wrist, and his tone’s steady as he shakes his head, firmly reassuring her, “This wasn’t you. You didn’t do this. It’s alright. Feathers - feathers fall out sometimes.”

“So it’s - it’s alright?”

“Yes, it’s fine.” Seeing the way that his left wing shakes, Felicity swallows. It isn’t fine.

“It’s not a big deal if feathers fall out?” Diggle questions hesitantly.

“No, it’s - not a big deal. It’s no deal. It’s fine.” Except the dread in his expression as Oliver plucks the alula feather from Felicity’s hand tells her that this is a very, very big deal. The several primary covert feathers that came loose with his fingers have drifted down, and remain scattered, like tiny pieces of ashy down littering the ground. Oliver refuses to meet their worried gazes as he stands on wobbly legs, wings flaring and tucking to steady him, hand tightly clenched around the alula feather. “Thank you both for your help tonight, but really, I’m okay. You can both go home.”

Felicity crosses her arms over her chest, hand flicking up briefly to straighten her glasses on her nose as she observes the winged vigilante calculatingly. Her heart is beating frantically due to her anxiety about Oliver’s reaction. He’s not acting as if he’s okay; he’s reacting as if this fallen feather is leading to the whole wing falling off. He’s shivering like a leaf, obviously shaken, but she isn’t going to press him, not when he’s in such a vulnerable and emotional state. Instead, she gently reaches out to caress the top of his wingbone for a second, smiling sadly when he stiffens at her touch, before motioning to Diggle that they should leave. Diggle raises an eyebrow, but doesn’t question her, offering Oliver a gruff farewell before grabbing his coat and clunking up the stairs out of sight.

“Change your bandages in four hours,” Felicity reminds him softly, withdrawing and picking up her coat and bag. Oliver nods, eyes lowered as he shuffles awkwardly, wings spreading to half span in such a way that she can tell that he’s feeling guilty at kicking them out. “Please try and sleep tonight, Oliver.”

“I will,” he answers.

She smiles again, and then heads for the stairs. Before she can reach the security door, however, Oliver calls her name quietly, causing her to whip around with a hopeful expression. It’s ridiculous, but she’s silently hoping that he’s going to ask her to stay. His wings are ruffled and a mess, and although he has only let her touch his wings once or twice, she will help him groom them if he asks.

“You don’t need to worry,” Oliver says quietly. “I promise you, I’m fine.”

“Goodnight, Oliver,” she responds.

Felicity spends the drive back to her apartment trying to calm herself down from a panic attack. Oliver’s feathers are falling out, and judging by his reaction to it, this is something very, very not good. She needs to find out what’s going on, fast, so that she can help him. It’s agonising to see him look so devastated. As soon as Felicity enters her apartment, she throws on her pyjamas, orders a pizza and jumps onto the couch, grabbing her laptop as she goes.

 _Bird feather loss reasons_ , she searches, the moment the laptop powers up.

Clicking on the first site that comes up that looks legit, Felicity almost has a heart attack as she reads the words, _Feather shedding in birds is a natural process. Most birds lose one or two feathers every month due to wear and damage. However, if the feather loss is on a larger scale, it could be due to ill or diminishing health_.

Oliver’s sick?! And he hasn’t told Felicity and Diggle about it? What is he sick with? Is he _dying_? Felicity immediately opens another tab up and searches, _bird diseases causing feather loss_. The rest of her night is occupied by her flicking through page after page, horrified, as she reads about bird illnesses and diseases that can cause feather loss. She falls asleep on the couch around three am with a pillow clasped to her stomach that’s soaked with tears that have fallen due to the fact that over three quarters of the diseases she’s read about result in death. God, Oliver’s probably _dying_ , and he hasn’t said _anything_! He’s allowed Felicity and Dig to leave - even pushed them to it! - most likely knowing that he’s sick, and going to get sicker. Felicity’s stunned and wrecked emotionally at the same time. She thought that Oliver trusts them. That they’re friends. Yet he hasn’t thought they will want to know - _need_ to know - that he’s sick.

The next day, after a very stressful day at work, Felicity storms down into the Foundry and marches straight up to Oliver, shoving Diggle aside as they’re both sparring using Eskrima rods on the training mats, shirtless.

She slams the dozens of printed pages from the websites she’s read into his chest, and Oliver’s arms scramble to grab at them, his wings beating in a frenzy. The bemused expression on his face makes Felicity fume, and she stabs her finger into his arm, hissing furiously, “Why didn’t you tell us that you’re sick?!”

She expects guilt and shame, but instead, Oliver just looks confused. It honestly throws Felicity for a few seconds. “I’m sick?” he repeats, frowning. He turns to Diggle, and their partner shrugs, just as clueless as the winged vigilante is. “I’m sick?”

“According to Felicity, you are.”

“Don’t act like you don’t know!” Felicity argues, punching him in the shoulder, and Oliver’s wings flutter in response as he takes a wary step back. She snatches the top page from the pile he’s holding in his arms, waving it in front of him. “This website says that feather loss is caused by ill and diminishing health! You’re sick, that’s why your feathers are falling out!”

Oliver’s eyes squeeze shut for a moment and he seems to have to take a moment to collect himself, because he backs up to one of the counters to dump the papers on top of it and braces his hands on it, groaning. “Felicity. I’m - I’m not sick.”

“Let’s have a look at that website,” Diggle murmurs, and Felicity passes it over to him before wrapping her arms around herself defensively. After a minute of reading, he looks up and says accusingly, “Says here you lose feathers if you’re sick. And you’ve been acting lethargic, tired; you’re thinner, your feathers are wilting and you’re weaker physically - you have to be sick.”

“Guys, I’m not sick!” Oliver insists, sweeping his arm frustratedly across the counter and knocking half the stack of paper to the floor, causing both Felicity and Diggle to leap back in alarm. “I’m not sick, alright! I’m -” He scrambles forwards to seize the paper out of Dig’s hand, and his eyes skip down it desperately, and then he rushes up to Felicity and holds it out, finger jabbing into it. “Look. Here. Just - just _read_ , okay?”

She accepts the paper back hesitantly, smoothing it out before reading. _Feather loss, however, is not only caused by illness. Feather loss can also be caused by a perfectly natural, healthy process in which the worn and damaged feathers are replaced by new plumage, which may be coloured and patterned differently due to mating and breeding season. This process is known as molting._

Very slowly, Felicity looks up. “You’re… molting?”

Oliver’s flushed a deep red in embarrassment, and his voice is small as he bobs his head in a nod. “Yes,” he whispers. His wings are recoiling in tightly to his spine, and Felicity’s heart goes out for him. He’s shy, admitting this.

“You’re losing feathers because you’re molting?” Diggle questions curiously.

“Yes!” Oliver pretty much shouts, hunching over the counter with his head in his shaking hands. “I’m molting, okay? My feathers are falling out because I am molting!”

Oliver isn’t sick. He’s healthy. He’s just shedding his feathers so he can grow new ones. Felicity tilts her head back in relief, rubbing her eyes with an annoyed sigh; she isn’t irritated with _Oliver_ , though, she’s more irritated with herself. The paragraph about molting is literally three paragraphs down from the one about illness and disease. In her distressed and tired state, she’d simply read the first few lines and immediately jumped to conclusions. If she’d read on just a little further, they could have avoided this debacle entirely - and Oliver wouldn’t be practically having a mental breakdown several feet away from her.

Felicity exchanges a glance with Diggle, and he looks just as helpless as she feels. Neither of them know how to approach the winged vigilante about this. Deciding to take one for the team, Felicity slips forwards, making sure she’s directly in Oliver’s line of sight and makes some noise, but not too much, before she carefully lays her hand on top of his on the worktop, thumb rubbing over his knuckle. Oliver flinches, wings quivering, but he doesn’t pull away, just takes a shuddering breath as he centers himself. He’s trying to cover up his bare, scarred torso with his arms, obviously feeling vulnerable, and Felicity ducks past quietly to grab one of his special sweatshirts with slits in it for his wings. God, how she just wants to hug him to comfort him; he needs to feel a physical connection to another human being to ground himself, but Felicity can tell that in his state, he’ll only reject her touch.

“I know I should have told you,” he says hoarsely, taking the grey sweatshirt and maneuvering his wings through the slits before yanking it on, shivering. “But it’s - you have to understand, molting is a private thing. It’s… _personal_. The last time I had a molt I was with Sara and after that, I -”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Felicity soothes, stepping forwards so that she can gently wrap her hands around his bicep. Oliver makes a small sound and bows his head, as if ashamed, but she tips his chin up with her hand, relieved that he doesn’t cower away from her. “I get it. And I’m sorry I forced you to tell us. Yesterday, I panicked after seeing your reaction to that alula feather and those coverts falling out.”

“You were pretty shaken, man,” Diggle agrees, settling on a stool and watching them both interact with a small smile, amused. “To be honest, it would have made sense if you were sick. You’ve been exhausted lately.”

Shrugging his wings, Oliver murmurs, “It’s been hard recovering from getting shot. My air sacs are still healing. I may only really need them for high altitude flights, but… I’ve been relying on the extra oxygen in that air in them so I have more energy available for fights. Without that oxygen… I’m slower.”

“So _that’s_ how you got clipped yesterday,” Diggle nods.

“Couldn’t move fast enough,” the vigilante growls, digging his nails into his palms as if punishing himself for that. Felicity’s own hands drop down to very carefully stop him. She doesn’t like it when he’s hurting, especially not when he’s hurting himself. “So no, I’m not… _sick_. I’m still recovery from injury and I’m entering a molt period.”

“I thought you had bird cancer or something,” Felicity comments off-handedly.

Oliver cracks a faint grin at that. Mission accomplished, she’s lightened the mood. Straightening and brushing himself down, Oliver replies, “Not bird cancer. Just… the beginning of molt. The, uh, alula feathers are the first to shed, normally. They signify the molt is starting. As soon as I knew that my primary coverts were falling out as well… that just confirmed it for me.”

He takes her hand, and Felicity swallows, trying not to get mentally lost in her thoughts about how warm and calloused they are (how good those hands would feel wrapped around her bare waist), as he leads her over to a counter in the back half of the Foundry, shrouded in darkness. It’s an area that she’d never think to go, and never want to go, and Diggle follows them; it becomes clear to Felicity that Oliver has chosen this particular area because it’s overlooked, as Diggle has an expression on his face that informs her this is new to him as well. Felicity lets out a low gasp as Oliver switches on a separate lamp, casting light over the table that’s hidden in the corner. He’s collected all of his fallen light grey and peppered feathers and attached little notes with letters and numbers on them to them using pieces of masking tape. They’re bagged into sections, and each feather looks as if it has been meticulously flattened and groomed before being stored.

Oliver picks up one of the bags that has the label ‘A’ stuck to the top. There are six white feathers, each approximately the length of a forefinger inside, all numbered and either with the letter ‘L’ or ‘R’ attached to it, obviously representing his left and right wing. “These are all my alula feathers. And those -” he points to the bag that’s labelled ‘P-C’, “Are my primary coverts.”

“You’re collecting them?” Felicity asks. “All of them?”

“I have to,” he mutters. “Have to make sure that they don’t get into the wrong hands. Once I’ve shed them all, I’ll burn them. Until then, I have to use this system to make sure that none go missing.” He fans out his wings, and Felicity’s worried gaze is immediately drawn to the identical small gaps on both wings, on the outer middle of his wings. Oliver has already molted a lot of primary coverts since yesterday, evidently. “Feathers, they - they fall out symmetrically, so that the wings are always even. And if I monitor the rate of fall, and the order the feathers molt in, I can track the progress of my molt.”

“How long does a full molt take?” Diggle asks.

Oliver shrugs. “At least two weeks. Can take up to a month. At the rate my coverts are falling at the moment though, I think it’ll be closer to twenty days.” He grimaces. “Not that that’s actually a good thing. The shorter and quicker the molt is, the more stressful it is.”

Felicity glances down at the paper she’s now holding in her hand. _Molt is an arduous and exhausting period, requiring high levels of energy and strength. Large amounts of protein need to be consumed so that the pinfeathers formed are healthy and hardy. Secure shelter is needed, as is a nearby food and water source. Flight is impaired, and often impossible after the flight feathers are shed. This creates a vulnerability to predators and sickness, which results in molt being a dangerous process._

Stressful is an understatement. Molt sounds more risky than cliff jumping.

She has to confess, she’s impressed. She had no idea that molt is this complicated and taxing, and no idea that Oliver could be so meticulous about this sort of thing. He’s clearly very serious about it. “So what do you need my help with?” she questions, flashing a beaming smile.

Oliver’s eyebrows knit together. “Uh… nothing. You’re not going to be here.” He turns to Diggle. “You either.”

“What?”

“Like I said before, molt is personal. I’m doing this by myself. Sara’s… not here, so I don’t have a molt companion, and therefore, I’ll do this alone.”

“Oliver, we’re not going to leave you alone down here for twenty days!” Felicity protests. It’s a ridiculous idea. “And this website says that molt is dangerous and exhaustive for you, so there is no way that you are going through this without us.”

Oliver whips away, grinding his teeth together with a growl. Felicity glares pointedly at him, getting distracted for a second as another one of the ashy primary coverts comes loose and detaches from the left wing, the small feather slowly sinking through the air onto the ground. Diggle doesn’t look as if he’s going to give up on this either, heavy stare levelled at the winged vigilante and position firm, expression set. If Oliver is going through this molt, which is going to be perilous and make him weak and in need of protecting, then they are not leaving him. They will not abandon him in his hour of need. Well, three weeks of need. Felicity winces. That’s not going to be fun, for him or them. Oliver does not do well when caged up, and from the sound of it, he’s going to remain Foundry-bound for the most of it.

“Let us help you, man,” Diggle says quietly.

After a moment of frigid, tense silence, Oliver deflates, ducking down to scoop up the covert as he replies, defeated, “Fine. You can still come to the Foundry during my molt. I just want you to know that my behaviour… will be strange. It might not make sense to you. I might act hostile to you sometimes. It’s… instinct.”

“You’re not going to drive us away, Oliver,” Felicity smiles. “In fact, I think this experience is going to draw us closer together as a team.”

“If you say so,” he mutters, striding away. He’s clearly sulking about not getting his own way, and by the way his wings spread to three quarter span, bristling, Felicity can sense this mood is going to last a little while. Felicity shoots Diggle a smirk, which he counters, when Oliver releases a loud unhappy huff. Their winged vigilante has a flare for dramatics, that’s for sure.

As soon as Oliver’s out of sight, on the other side of the Foundry, playing with his arrows, Felicity turns to Diggle, informing him seriously, “We need to head to a Costco.”

He looks bewildered. “How come?”

She points to the paragraph on molt requirements.

“We’re going to need protein shake powder. Lots and _lots_ of protein shake powder.”

* * *


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was absolutely blown away by the amount of support I've received for this fic! Thank you all so much! I really appreciate it :)
> 
> I hope you enjoy the second chapter! Lexi x
> 
> Thank you once again to Becky, @nvwhovian, for beta-ing!

* * *

The first three days of the molt are just like all other days in the Foundry, except perhaps for Oliver’s constant nervous energy making him antsy and jumpy. Felicity makes sure that she spends most of her early mornings, evenings and nights there to keep the winged vigilante company, and Diggle does the same, although his schedule is much more sporadic. The feathers continue falling, and often in the mornings, Felicity will walk down the stairs to find a blanket of ashy feathers covering the ground, with Oliver angrily trying to scoop them all up into bags for sorting later. His shedding rate is apparently increasing. Most of his primary coverts have fallen by the end of the third day, with the marginal coverts beginning to come loose, although these feathers come away much easier due to their soft, down-like consistency.

It’s day four that marks the first significant change. Before, Oliver was fine remaining in the Foundry to train with Diggle, despite being frustrated at being cooped up. Now, the winged vigilante’s wings ache and itch too much for him to manage to work through a training session. Without the training keeping him occupied, Oliver is wracked with energy, with no way to get rid of it except to pace, fiddle and tinker. The ever present frown on his face, indicating his unhappiness with the situation, prompts Felicity to come up with a solution to stave of Oliver’s boredom, and very soon she has an idea for an activity which they can all enjoy.

“A movie marathon?” Oliver looks like a deer in the headlights when the blonde plops her bag, which is packed with DVDs, down on the counter, and grinning widely at him, she empties them all out all over the scattered weapons there. “Why?”

“You’re bored,” Felicity answers simply. “I thought this might help. And I bought you this as well.” She chucks the box over to him and Oliver catches it in one hand expertly, his wings quivering with curiosity. She laughs at his baffled expression as he examines the object inside. “It’s an octahedron Rubix cube,” she explains. “It’s to occupy your hands, they’ve been fidgety lately.”

“You - you bought this for me?”

“Consider it an early birthday present.” Even though she doesn’t know when his birthday is. Or really, how old he is. Huh. She’ll have to get onto that. There’s no way she’s going to miss out on the chance to celebrate Oliver’s birthday, especially if he’s never had a proper party before, with balloons and cake. If he’s never had a proper childhood, at least this is one thing she knows she can aid him in experiencing.

Oliver looked as if he’s about to cry with joy, and the appreciation shining in his blue eyes as he raises his gaze to her makes her heart swell. His wings are puffing out noticeably, something that only happens when he’s happy (or occasionally angry), and Felicity bites her lip to hide her smile as Diggle’s head pokes around one of them, glaring at the limbs. “Thank you,” the vigilante replies, voice slightly rough. “Nobody - nobody’s ever given me a present before.” She thinks her heart might break hearing that, but then Oliver darts forwards to her side, tugging at her wrist as he demands urgently, “What do I do with it?”

Chuckling, Felicity mixes up all the colours on the Rubix and shows him how it works, and as soon as Oliver’s gaze turns focused and determined, her smile grows even wider. This was a good idea. She’s glad she thought of it. Diggle was going through the movies that she’s brought along with her, most of them old Disney classics that she can’t legally digitally download onto one of her laptops without taking up lots of storage. When the man shoots her an understanding glance, Felicity shuffles shyly, fiddling with her hands. Oliver didn’t have a proper childhood… so he’s never watched Disney movies. So they’re going to spend the evening watching Disney movies together, like a family.

Once the laptop is set up on top of a cardboard box on the training mats, and blankets and pillows from the medical cot are strewn around them, Felicity gently pulls at Oliver’s hand to encourage him to sit. The winged vigilante cautiously kneels down, wings flaring high behind him to avoid brushing the floor, before he settles down cross-legged, wings slumping behind him. Diggle puts on _The Lion King_ , and by the ten-minute mark, they can both see that Oliver’s enthralled by his entranced expression. His wings continue to flare and tuck throughout the movie, and the movements cause a few of his marginal coverts to drift loose, and without even realising what she’s doing, Felicity finds herself combing her fingers through the light grey feathers to clear them from the wing, and helping some of the other loose feathers which are caught fall.

A jolt passes through Oliver as if he’s been electrocuted and he releases a small noise that sounds similar to a puppy’s short whine, back and wings arching under her touch. For a second, Felicity’s scared that she’s startled and frightened him.

“I’m sorry,” she apologises quickly. “I shouldn’t have -”

“No,” Oliver interjects just as rapidly, shaking his head and to her shock, he spreads his wing out - _back towards her hands_. “It… it was nice. Could you…” His cheeks are starting to flush, a rosy colour rising up his neck. “Um, you can keep doing that if… if you want to.”

“You like it?” She begins threading her fingers through the feathers again; she raises an eyebrow and a smirk twitches at her lips when Oliver shudders beneath her touch, wing trembling but pressing more insistently into her hands. “Oh, you _do_ like this.”

“Fallen feathers that get caught up with others, they - they make my wings itchy,” he breathes, emitting an almost erotic sounding groan of pleasure that makes Felicity suddenly feel very hot and flustered. God, if he keeps making those sort of noises throughout the night, she’s going to need to take a _very_ cold shower later on and clean out her brain by watching kitten videos. “It’s relieving, yes.”

“Here, let me get the other wing,” Diggle suggests, but before his hands can even make contact with the ashy feathers, the wing snaps inwards to Oliver’s spine, and the winged vigilante sets him with a very suspicious, cold look, one that confuses Felicity massively. Oliver has never rejected Dig’s help or touch before. Drawing away warily, Diggle corrects lowly, “Or not.”

The weirdest part is, Oliver doesn’t even seem to notice or recognise that he’s yanked away from his partner so violently. He just turns back to the movie, hands playing with the Rubix cube and eyes fixed on the screen; he continues to allow Felicity to preen his wings, straightening the flight feathers and grooming the coverts with no problem whatsoever. But he reacted negatively to Diggle. After pondering on it for a while, the blonde shakes her head, forcing it out of her mind. Oliver warned them that his behaviour will change, that it would seem strange to them. Maybe this is part of it?

The next day, things take a worrisome turn. Oliver mentioned on the first day that around day five and six, the molt would accelerate, and things would get bizarre. Felicity didn’t expect it to be quite like this, however.

Oliver develops protein cravings, at an alarming standard. No matter how many slices of ham, burgers and protein shakes he has, he still craves more protein. Felicity even catches him that evening shovelling the protein powder into his mouth dry, he’s so desperate for it. With the protein cravings, arrives what starts off as very subtle food aggression, but then escalates to a distressing level. Diggle goes out to get them Big Belly Burger, hoping that the beef will satisfy the winged vigilante’s puzzling, overly-high demand for protein. When Felicity teasingly reaches out to steal one of Oliver’s curly fries, Oliver grips them tightly to his chest and puffs his wings out threateningly, hitting her with a lethal glance. But when Felicity pulls her hand back, swallowing, he goes back to eating as if nothing has just happened.

The most disconcerting part of all this is the fact that Oliver seems to have evolved an aversion to Diggle out of the blue. They have no idea why. Maybe it’s because the man reminds the vigilante of somebody who beat, abused or hurt him in his troubled past. Maybe it’s just because he feels intimidated. All Felicity and Diggle know for certain is that Oliver’s now reluctant to allow Diggle down into the Foundry, and when he is down there, the vigilante avoids him as much as possible. If Dig even comes within a foot of his wings, Oliver glares and occasionally growls, tensing up as if getting ready for a fight. 

Diggle never does anything threatening to warrant this behaviour, which is probably why he’s getting a little pissed off whenever he’s treated like that. He never gets snappy though, which Felicity admires about the older man; Diggle has endless patience when it comes to Oliver. She wouldn’t be able to act so civilly around Oliver if he’s hissing at her - she would definitely be much more upset, and want explanations for his poor manners. Instinct be damned, it’s plain _rude_.

Day seven, Felicity arrives at the Foundry with another two bottles of special protein whey milk to make the shakes with to find that Diggle is pacing outside, looking extremely agitated. 

“What’s going on?” she questions, flashing a confused look at him and taking a surprised step backwards when Diggle lashes out to hit one of the Foundry doors, knuckles scraping across the coarse metal, making blood well from the gashes. “Whoa, hey, John! Calm down!”

“He locked me out,” Diggle growls.

She blinks. “What?”

“He locked me out of the Foundry, Felicity! _ME!_ He wouldn’t let me in! And all he did when I asked him to, when I wanted to know why, was _snarl_ at me! Like some wild animal! I don’t know what’s going on with him, but it has got me officially freaked out.”

Felicity doesn’t know what to say. “... maybe he just wants some space?” she suggests, although it sounds weak, even to her ears.

“Then he’d _tell_ me he needs space! This isn’t like Oliver, Felicity. This isn’t - this isn’t _him_.”

Diggle’s angry, and he has every right to be. He’s been supporting Oliver since the very beginning, and now the vigilante has just shut him out without even offering a proper reason. Felicity feels an empathetic fury rising within her. Diggle doesn’t deserve this sort of treatment. She tries to think up some kind of reason why Oliver would lock his partner out of the Foundry without telling him why, but every single time she thinks she might have an answer, she comes up short. There simply is no logical excuse. She’s already made up her mind - she’s going to have a stern talk with Oliver. Get him to realise what he’s done wrong, and encourage him to apologise. She isn’t going to clean up this mess for him.

“Dig, why don’t you go home for the evening, take the night off,” she suggests gently. “I’ll speak to him, try and find out what’s going on, why he’s acting this way. Oliver’s very stressed because of the molt and it might just be that he’s particularly emotional today and wants to be alone. He most likely won’t let me in either.”

Diggle shoots her a narrow eyed look, saying in a rather accusative tone, “He asked for you.”

Her heart stops. “Um... “

“He told me to go away, and that he wanted you.”

How is she supposed to respond to that!?

Oliver has been asking for her? She just stands there for a moment, frozen and gaping. Diggle isn’t looking at her anymore, and is instead walking away back to his town car, but from his body language, he’s obviously annoyed that Oliver has chosen Felicity over him, despite knowing him longer. She feels bad for Diggle, but there’s a tiny piece of Felicity’s mind that’s secretly overjoyed that Oliver trusts her that much. Diggle’s already gone by the time that Felicity has formulated a response, so she just heads down to the Foundry. It takes only five minutes for her to overpower the electronic lock by hacking into it with her cell phone. As she hops down the steps, she crafts a strict speech in her head about not pushing away the people you’re closest to in her head.

“Oliver!” Felicity calls out, dropping her bag onto her chair and squinting through the dark space, fumbling with her fingers for the light switch. She can’t see him. He’s probably lurking in the shadows again, like a skulking wolf shying from the light. “Where are you? You’re in for it, mister. Diggle is very angry at you, and by very angry, I mean he is _extremely_ pissed off with you.”

There’s nothing for a moment, and then a quiet, “Over here.” Deciding it will be safer for her not to try and make her way over to where his voice was coming from in the pitch black, Felicity finally finds the switch and flicks it. The lights burst on, flooding the damp space with light, making her grimace and squeeze her eyes shut in brief pain. A deep rumbling sound erupts from the corner, sounding miserable and heavy-hearted.

Oliver is curled up in a pile of blankets and pillows, shirtless with his wings wrapped around him as he munches on lentils and pumpkin seeds from a trail mix, Felicity’s laptop playing _The Rescuers_ at his feet. There’s a little pile of shed feathers next to him, a mixture of lighter coloured ash and peppered dark grey. He perks up as she approaches, a sad smile on his face which vanishes, fading into a blank slate, as he catches sight of her furious expression.

Crossing her arms, Felicity shoots him a pointed look and questions, “What’s going on? Why did you refuse to let Dig in?” He swallows visibly, glancing away so he can pause the screen and curl up even tighter. “You’ve been rude to him, Oliver. Horrible, awful to him, over the last few days. Dig is patient, extremely so with you; he’s much more patient than I would ever be, to be honest. But there is a line, and you crossed it today. I can’t believe you locked him out of here, that is a new low even for you, and you need to apologise to him if you want to repair your relationship with him because -”

“I know,” he says quietly.

“ - he has limits, Oliver, just like any other human - wait. You know?” she frowns.

He nods. “I know. It was mean. I’ve been terrible to him. That’s why I told him to go.”

Moving closer with a confused expression, Felicity slowly kneels down onto one of the blankets so she’s on his level, resting her back onto the wall. “... I’m not following.”

“I didn’t want to be mean to him anymore,” Oliver mumbles, right wing cautiously outstretching to sneak behind her back and cushion her from the biting coldness of the wall, hooking around her side a bit to pull her closer into the nest like creation. “So I told him to go. I can’t be around him without wanting to bolt, hit him or ignore him, and I - can’t stop it. It’s like an instinct, I can’t fight it. It’s not fair on either of us. I don’t want to make him sadder and angrier than he already is. If he’s not here, I can’t be mean to him.”

Speechless, Felicity leans back with a thump, trying to will back the tears that are springing to her eyes. Oliver seriously understands that his behaviour towards Diggle is hurtful, and he’s trying to take steps to avoid damaging his relationship with his partner even further. Sure, he’s going about it the wrong way and is driving a bigger wedge between them - but he has good intentions. The vigilante’s wings tuck in around them both as he scowls into his knees, muttering under his breath, and Felicity gently places her hand on top of his shoulder supportively.

“Oh, Oliver,” she says softly. “That’s… that’s sweet of you, but that’s not how this works. If you want to make things better with Dig, you have to explain and apologise to him. You can’t just… shut him out, because you think it will make things better. You need to talk to him.”

His face screws up and he turns away, hugging his knees closer to his chest. “That’s easy for you to say,” Oliver rasps, and Felicity’s heart clenches when he drags his wing out from behind her back, and positions it between them. They are literally separated now by a protective wall of feathers, and it pains her that Oliver feels insecure enough that he thinks he needs it. “I can’t do… _this_. Emotions. I can’t… _process_ them. I can’t deal with my own feelings, you really think that I can cope with yours and Dig’s as well?”

Biting her lip, she whispers, “Okay. So you don’t let Diggle in. But then why’d you let me in?”

She expects his blue eyes to be stormy, clouded with grey, but they are surprisingly bright. “I don’t know,” he replies, voice small. “You’re - _different_. I feel safe around you in a way I don’t around him.”

And doesn’t that just create a burst of heat within her aching heart. Oliver’s admitting that he trusts Felicity, perhaps to a greater degree to even Diggle. Inhaling a shuddering breath and opening her mouth to hesitantly respond to that, Felicity doesn’t get the chance in the end, because a spasm sweeps through Oliver’s left wing and he moans. She yelps and ducks to the side when he lances sideways desperately, fingers grappling at the wrist of the wing as he scratches, hissing. He can’t seem to reach it, however, releasing an exhausted, frustrated whine, so Felicity takes things into her own hands.

A permanent blush reddening her cheeks, she slaps his hands away and straightens up onto her knees so she can comb her fingers tenderly through the light grey, almost pearly white marginal coverts, digging her nails into the skin to scratch that itch of his. The winged vigilante immediately unwinds with a relieved sigh, stretching out on his front over Felicity’s lap so she can reach his wing better. The action of him lounging over her, his head resting on her stomach, bare torso over her legs, and one arm curling around her waist, has Felicity’s throat clogging up. Those tendrils of heat in her heart rush outwards to fill her entire body with an unfathomable desire and excitement.

She pretty much whimpers when he buries his face into her shirt, releasing a breathy groan that sounds far too titillating and salacious to be normal. God, what is this man doing to her? Is he trying to melt her into a gooey puddle on the ground? Does Oliver _know_ he’s making those pornographic noises? Is he making them on purpose just to fluster her? Judging by his screwed up face and blissed out expression as she continues to groom the feathers, pulling out the loose coverts that are causing the itching problem, he has no idea.

It’s when Felicity trails her hand down to his darker grey, pepper coloured secondary coverts that Oliver’s back curves under her touch and his wings puff out, a soft, drawn-out, “ _Yesss_ ,” of pleasure breaking from his lips.

Felicity freezes for a second, her throat too dry and forcing her to swallow as she slowly draws back her shaking hands from the feathers. Puppies, kittens, plants during photosynthesis. She attempts to think of anything and everything to calm her racing heartbeat and the warmth coiling in her abdomen.

But then as she stops grooming, Oliver whines, turning back to set an earnest look on her, pleading, “Please don’t stop.”

She has to, though, before _things_ start getting to her too much, making her even hotter and bothered. Felicity checks her watch and has never been more grateful to know the specific time. “It’s nearly eight o’clock, you need to have a protein shake before your cravings hit again.” Yanking herself away from him, scrambling to her feet, Felicity strides away at a pace that she can tell is too fast, too desperate. “I bought special high-protein milk to make it with, we should try it out!”

Her voice sounds strained, so she glances back to aim a reassuring smile his way, to ensure that Oliver knows it isn’t anything that he has done wrong that is causing her to pull away. But Oliver just has an expression on his face like a kicked puppy, bare chest covered with a thin sheen of sweat and his wings so beautifully ruffled and messy that he looks as if he has just emerged from some kinky sort of sexcapade.

And nope, now Felicity’s thinking about what kind of sexcapades Oliver would enjoy getting up to, and her lower abdomen is seizing with that crushing, overwhelming heat again and oh god, if she doesn’t get a shirt on him soon, she’s going to _explode_.

“My wing still itches,” Oliver complains tiredly. Felicity snorts when his lip curls in what roughly resembles a pout, feathers twitching furiously.

“Diggle brought by a spray bottle yesterday. I was researching online and it says that if we keep your feathers moist using a mixture made of three-quarters water and one quarter bio-oil, your skin shouldn’t dry out and your feathers shouldn’t irritate you as much,” Felicity offers. “It’ll help your pinfeathers come in healthily as well. I could try that tonight, if you want.”

Oliver perks up, heaving himself to his feet, wobbling ever so slightly but his wings flaring and tucking to balance him out. “Yes, please. It sounds weird, but if you think it will help…” 

He starts wiping his chest down with a fresh towel, and Felicity swears that one day, she’s going to get him back and make him feel very uncomfortable by strutting around in only her bra and panties. See how much _he_ likes being teased like that… on second thoughts, maybe that isn’t such a good idea. That would be extremely awkward for all of them, but mortifying for her especially.

Luckily, the rest of the evening and night is just spent drinking many, many protein shakes and watching more classic Disney movies. She makes him call Diggle before they begin their more enjoyable activities, and from she can tell the apology he issues is stunted and awkward, but the vigilante’s partner seems appeased, and Oliver hangs up with a satisfied look on his face. Felicity texts Dig just to be sure, and he seems better, calmer than before and also much more understanding to the situation. He agrees that staying away and giving Oliver space is the best idea, and Felicity finishes the conversion by texting a promise to keep him updated on the molt situation.

Oliver is shockingly clingy, wanting to have a point of contact between them both at all times as they huddle up together in the little nest he’s made in the corner. Since it’s only his side or wing pressing into her arm, Felicity doesn’t get too rattled. The vigilante’s hardly fazed by the fact that she begins using the spray bottle to bathe his feathers in water and oil, grooming out his tangled tertials absentmindedly, although he does shiver whenever her hands stroke up against the bare skin of his wings where the covert feathers are already shedding. Felicity makes sure that she sprays the oil and water mixture onto that bare skin and where it’s most itchy near his wing wrists, and the contented little noises that erupt from his throat makes her smile.

Oliver’s clinginess to her continues into day eight and day nine. She can’t exactly say she minds it. Having the winged vigilante follow her around like a lost puppy is amusing at first, but after he’s at her heels for three hours or so, wings occasionally spreading out and blocking her view of her monitors, it gets a little annoying.

Day ten. Felicity’s eyes slam shut as a few grey feathers float down in front of her face, signifying that Oliver’s position, standing barely an inch from the back of her chair with his hands on her shoulders and wings towering over them both, has not changed.

“Hey, Oliver, why don’t I put a movie on for you to watch?” she suggests, keeping her voice light and friendly. She can’t very well be grumpy with him, not when she knows this attachment he’s developed to her stems from pure instinct.

He shoots her a wary look. “Will you watch it with me?”

“I’m compiling the research files on the people on the List, like you asked me to,” she replies gently. “I’m a little busy.” He looks crestfallen, wings slumping. Great, now she feels bad for upsetting him. “But I can work on my laptop and sit next to you, if you want?”

He nods happily, and then they both settle down in his nest, _Oliver and Company_ playing on her laptop as the vigilante preens and grooms his thinning wings and Felicity works on the List profiles. Due to one of the side effects of the molt being fatigue and excessive tiredness, Oliver drifts off to sleep a short time after the kitten and gangster dog’s first musical encounter. Because he’s leaning on Felicity, however, this means that when his body goes lax and he slumps over limply, he falls straight into her lap. His head is buried against her stomach so that they are once again in the position that caused the blonde to become so flustered.

Stiffening for a moment, Felicity carefully closes her laptop and puts it aside, judging what the best cause of action will be. Oliver isn’t hurting her in any way. He looks as if he’s getting cosy, hands gripping onto the hem of her shirt possessively as he snuffles serenely, face peaceful and impassive. She doesn’t want to wake him up.

A hiccupping sigh escaping her lips, Felicity finally gives into that burning desire that she has to run her hands through his hair and does so, gently scratching at his scalp and smiling with a chuckle as he practically purrs in his sleep beneath her, wings trembling.

“What am I going to do with you?” she says fondly. “You’re driving me up the wall here, Oliver. In more ways than one. I don’t know how much longer I can cope with this tension between us. I don’t even know if you _know_ there’s tension. I’ve noticed it, but it might have blindsided you. Then again, most complex emotions tend to confuse you, so you probably haven’t noticed.” She sighs, tipping her head back against the cold wall. “We’re only on day nine of this molt and we’re both already going crazy. You, because of your weird molt behavioural changes and me because you’re all cuddly and soft and squishy. Messing with my brain.”

She sighs, glancing away. “How am I going to survive another eleven days of this?”

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed. Please leave kudos and comment.
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13, @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You're all such wonderful readers. Thank you so much for all your support. Your comments have really helped me through a rough weekend.
> 
> Thanks to Becky, @nvwhovian, for once again beta-ing :) And thank you to my friend IRL (you know who you are) for creating the wonderful banner shown below, and others, which I'll slowly roll out as the fic is posted.
> 
> Just so everybody is aware, this chapter is longer than the others, as the next one is a little bit shorter than normal. You'll see why at the end ;) It just dawned on me that since some of you aren't following me on Tumblr and Twitter, you're not aware of the posting schedule for this fic. **Chapters are posted every Tuesday and Friday.**
> 
> Also, _game for the comments!_ Oliver's going through his molt and will end up with a new snazzy pair of wings afterwards, with possibly different coloured plumage. What colour do you think his new plumage might be?

* * *

* * *

The next day, day eleven, Felicity feels guilty at having felt sorry for herself, because things take a turn for the worse concerning Oliver. When Felicity drops off breakfast for him, a box full of cream cheese and smoked salmon bagels with a pot of Greek yoghurt, he has a low grade fever and he’s flushed, breathing heavily.

He reassures her that he’s fine, so she gives him some Advil. He’s reluctant to take the pills initially, gaze wary and suspicious, and Felicity’s starkly reminded of Oliver’s less than ideal, less than happy childhood. She wonders how many pills he was forced to down when he was younger, how many of them he regretted swallowing. She manages to convince him to take them eventually, swearing that she won’t make him again if he doesn’t like how he feels.

“I have to go to work, but I promise I will be back later,” Felicity tells him, smiling at how he’s rubbing his wings together in a strange imitation of how flies rub their little feet together, causing molted feathers to fall to the ground.

A couple of peppered grey coverts drifting down trigger the vigilante to sneeze. Oliver’s seated on a stool near the weapons counter, fiddling with his octahedron Rubik’s. He’s not looking at her, staring steadfastly down at the puzzle in his hands. Felicity presses on, despite the fact she senses she might not have the vigilante’s full attention.

“I have the afternoon off, so you should expect me back around one. I’ll bathe your wings again and we can watch another movie with protein shakes. I even got all the latest Pixar movies for us tonight.”

“You don’t have to do that.”

She pauses, bemused for a brief second at his forlorn tone. “... What, bring those Pixar movies? I’ve already downloaded them on my laptop, it was no trouble.”

“No, I mean…” Oliver won’t meet her eyes, biting his lip and shuffling rigidly. He has to pause just to wipe the sweat from his heated skin, as it’s dripping down into his eyes now. They’ll definitely have to give his hair a rinse and a quick clean later. “You… you don’t have to spend your whole afternoon here with me.”

She’s thrown. He’s become quite emotionally open over these last few days, but he sounds… vulnerable. Unsure. It isn’t at all like him, or how she’s come to know him throughout this molt period so far. “Why wouldn’t I? You’re in molt and you’re sick, don’t you think it would be nice for you to have a friend around? We… we can even start watching the Dreamworks movies, if we finish all the Pixar ones.”

To her astonishment, his blue eyes are shining with tears as he raises his gaze to her, the cobalt in them striking. He sniffles, and Felicity shakes her head, aghast. Oliver’s crying? Oliver _never_ cries. Is the molt seriously fucking him up so much emotionally that he’s on the edge of a mental breakdown?

“Don’t talk like that,” he whimpers, muffling a sob in his wings as he wraps them around himself protectively, as if shielding himself from her.

“Like what?” Felicity whispers. She remains motionless in place, scared that the tiniest movement might cause him to freak out or bolt on her. Or even attack her.

“Don’t talk like you’re coming back!” Oliver shouts, lashing out with his wings so that they flare intimidatingly, forcing her to back up a step.

Felicity’s eyes widen. “What are you talking about?” she manages. “Oliver, of course I’m coming back. I’m not leaving you. How could you think that?”

He rakes a shaking hand through his hair, grimacing at the sweat that coats it afterwards and makes his hair stick up in spikes. “My most dangerous habit is trusting people,” he mutters. “And that’s always resulted in getting stabbed in the back. Being beaten. Hurt. I… I trust _you_. I learned to trust you. Who _wouldn’t_ trust you? You’re kind, and warm, and just… _remarkable_.” Trembling, he desperately wipes tears from his eyes. “But you’ll leave too. I can’t imagine you betraying me for anything, but everybody leaves in the end, so you’re going to walk away, and I’m going to be alone again. So please, just… if you’re going to walk away, do it now. Don’t drag out my suffering, Felicity, please, because if you leave - I don’t think I’ll survive another heartbreak.”

And then he rushes forwards and collapses into her arms, sobbing. The octahedron Rubik's drops to the ground and skids across the floor with a clatter. Felicity has no idea what to do or what to say, standing there, eyes as round as plates and a numbness washing over her body that feels like shock. That suffocating feeling is quickly overtaken and replaced, though, by an immense sympathy, and as soon as Oliver releases the first sob into her shoulder, Felicity wraps her arms around him. She cradles the back of his head, scraping her nails through the hair at the nape in a caring motion, shushing him quietly as she tries to comfort him. Her other arm slips beneath his wings to rub soothing circles on his lower back. It’s the only thing she can think to do, not able to find words to reply to that emotional statement.

Oliver just keeps crying, his tears hot and wet against her neck, but his legs are shaking beneath him. Worried he’s going to fall over any minute now, Felicity carefully guides him over to the training mats and helps him sit down, before hurrying to his nest in the corner to grab all the blankets and pillows. She settles down beside him, covering the vigilante in blankets and sliding a pillow under his head, and as soon as Oliver sinks down into it, he passes out. Felicity has to bite her lip to hold back her own sob at seeing his sorrowful and depressed expression smooth out as he slumbers.

Oliver never makes heartfelt confessions like that; she’s never thought he would ever, ever open up to her to that degree. Oliver seemed - _scared_. Scared of being alone, scared of losing somebody else he cares about.

Behind that fierce, rough winged warrior exterior is a frightened little boy, terrified of being abandoned and left alone in the shadows. It breaks her heart.

She can’t leave him alone in this state, so Felicity calls into work and takes a sick day. It isn’t as if they can deny her it, and as she hasn’t taken one in three years; she’s certainly due one. Encasing Oliver’s bare torso in a blanket so he’s wrapped up like a burrito, she has to call Dig to ask how to put an IV in. Oliver’s fever isn’t going to be breaking anytime soon, meaning he’s going to be sweating a lot, and if he stays unconscious for the rest of the day then he isn’t going to get the fluids he needs to stay hydrated and healthy. An IV is the only solution to this. Diggle suggests eagerly that he come down to help out, since if Oliver is passed out he can’t very well object to it, but Felicity disagrees. If Oliver wakes up halfway through the day to find that the blonde has allowed his partner inside, he’ll go ballistic. In his emotional, vulnerable condition, Felicity’s clueless as to how he will express his anger. He could very quickly become violent.

IV fitted correctly and safe from dehydration, Oliver stays blissfully unaware of his surroundings as Felicity begins working on his wings. They’re easily manipulated due to their limpness, so the blonde can roll the vigilante onto his front and spread out the wings behind him on the floor. During the mixing of the water and oil for the spray bottle, Felicity examines the wings closely, frowning when she realises that the tips of his flight feathers, specifically his secondaries and primaries, are wearing away rapidly, exposing the quills. That is worrying. Oliver hadn’t mentioned this kind of thing happening in the molt before. Concluding that she’ll question the winged vigilante on it later, Felicity tackles the task of grooming Oliver’s wings for the day.

It takes around an hour this time, mostly because she has to cover both the primary, secondary and marginal coverts, ending up with what looks like hundreds of light grey and peppered feathers in a stack beside her. Once that’s completed, Felicity sweeps them all up into a bag and plonks it down on the counter that Oliver’s using to sort the feathers into bags. Usually, the vigilante spends the hours where Felicity is at work sitting at this desk and sorting the feathers out, labelling them and ordering them correctly. It’s a difficult and time-consuming job, which is precisely why it’s ideal for him to do whilst the blonde is away. It nips his boredom in the bud and puts his pent up energy to use. 

By the time Oliver wakes up, it’s getting late. Felicity used the rest of the time he was unconscious to complete some work on her laptop and update the security of the Foundry, but she’s relieved when the winged vigilante starts twitching, finally stirring. Seeing his eyes fluttering open out of the corner of her gaze, Felicity hurriedly heads over to the mats to kneel beside him, placing one hand on his hip encouragingly. Internally, she’s anxious; hopefully Oliver is more emotionally stable than this morning.

“Hey,” she greets him softly when he blinks blearily up at her, confusion and exhaustion marring his face. “How are you feeling? That fever knocked you on your ass real good, didn’t it?”

“What time is it?” Oliver questions groggily, voice hoarse from sleep.

He tries sitting up but just ends up collapsing half across her lap with a grunt, muscles not responding properly due to his lack of energy. The vigilante appears more flushed than before, so Felicity gently pushes him off and stands to fetch the first aid kit, brushing her hand over his shoulder.

She checks her watch. “Twenty five past nine,” she answers. Thermometer found, she urges him to sit cross legged on the mats, sticking it into his mouth.

He glares at her, but doesn’t spit it out. His hair is sticking up in all directions and his wings are puffing out as he huffs unhappily. He looks so endearing, nothing like the ferocious winged crusader he truly is, that she has to bite back a grin. She can tell by his pouty, sulky expression that there’s an inner child buried deep within Oliver. This bout of sickness caused by the molt is bringing it to the surface, however. And boy, that inner child is too damn adorable.

The vigilante whines in annoyance. “That means I’ve already missed my two scheduled protein shakes this morning.”

Felicity stops, dread lancing through her. “Oliver. It’s 9:24 _pm_. It’s night.”

Oliver looks surprised, reaching up to take the thermometer out of his mouth. “I slept for nearly twenty four hours?”

Oh no. No no no. This is not good. “You can’t remember this morning?”

“What happened this morning?” he asks, frowning.

Seriously not good. Oliver can’t remember _anything_ that happened? That means he doesn’t remember his nervous breakdown on her. What’s Felicity meant to do? She’s disconcerted. If she tells Oliver the truth, therefore informing him that in his feverish state he’s lost memories, he will undoubtedly panic, but she can’t lie to his face. He’ll never trust her again if he finds out. “You - you woke up,” she says cautiously. “We had breakfast and a… short conversation before you went back to sleep.”

As she expects, an agitated expression streaks across his face. “I don’t remember that. Why don’t I remember that?” He tries to look down at the thermometer, an anxious rumble erupting from his chest, but Felicity quickly darts forwards and snatches it out of his hand before he can check it. “Felicity?!”

102.5 degrees. His body temperature is reaching a dangerous high, and they need to get him cooled down. That’s most likely what’s causing the memory loss and confusion. Taking hold of his trembling hands, Felicity fixes her eyes on his, trying to convey as much reassurance into the gaze as possible.

“Oliver. Calm down. It’s okay. You were very, very tired when you woke up this morning, so I’m not surprised you can’t remember what happened. The exhaustion is natural, you said past day ten you would be so tired you’d sleep a lot more. It’s day eleven. Don’t worry about missing our conversation. You were half asleep,” she lies. It’s better for her to put his mind at ease using a half lie, rather than tell him the truth and distress Oliver more.

He swallows, wings fluttering weakly behind him. “What did we talk about?”

“Protein shake flavours.” Holy shit, she’s a crappy liar.

“Oh.” Glancing away, the vigilante struggles to get to his feet. When his knees falter beneath him, Felicity surges forwards worriedly to support him, angling her shoulder under his bare armpit. She has to slip her arms around his bare, sweaty torso to help carry him, and of course, ridiculous woman that she is, she blushes, averting her eyes from him in embarrassment. Oliver’s eyes narrow and he makes a soft noise of bafflement as he sees her work bag and laptop. “Did - did you miss work and stay here with me all day?”

“You’re ill,” she replies. “I wasn’t going to leave you. I think I should stay here overnight as well. Your fever isn’t going down and I don’t want you getting worse.”

“Oh, no, you - you don’t have to do that,” Oliver protests, although his voice is quiet. She can tell he isn’t actually objecting. “You’ve already done enough for me over the last dozen or so days.”

 

“Oliver, you’re my friend. I’m not going to leave when you’re sick,” Felicity says firmly. “Friends don’t abandon each other in their hour of need.” She hesitates, asking warily, “You - you know that I’m not going to abandon you, right?”

It’s pressing his buttons, a true test of whether or not Oliver can recall anything from that morning’s interactions, but he remains blank, just frowning in puzzlement down at her as they slowly limp over to the monitor setup so he can collapse down onto one of the stools backwards, arms propped up on the backrest. “Why do you ask that?”

“I don’t know,” she says quickly. “I just - I want you to know that I’m here for the long haul. In sickness and in health. For better, for worse.” Her eyes widen before squeezing shut, mortification making her cheeks redden. “Oh god, I need to think before I talk. I totally didn’t mean to liken our friendship to marriage or anything, that’s just weird -”

“Felicity,” Oliver cuts in, with a shy smile.

“... Yes?”

“Thank you. That means a lot to me.”

Diggle drops off an air mattress and duvet for her whilst delivering Big Belly Burger for them both, and he offers Oliver a small, hesitant smile as he deposits the stuff off with Felicity at the entrance of the Foundry. Although Oliver stays several metres back, eyeing his partner cautiously, he does respond with a tick upwards of his lips. Diggle leaves with a firm nod, and Felicity heads back into the Foundry with Oliver at her heels. They set up the air mattress together, the vigilante insisting that it be stationed directly next to his nest.

They eat their Big Belly Buster Burgers sitting next to each other on the bed, Oliver with a cold damp towel on his chest, stealing each other’s curly fries; the winged vigilante growls whenever Felicity reaches for his, but she just slaps his hand away and strikes him with a stern glance, and he caves, muttering under his breath before grinning. After watching Toy Story and its sequel, it’s nearing midnight, and since Oliver’s starting to fall asleep again anyway due to his fatigue and fever, they head off to bed.

Sleep evades Felicity for several hours, and she finds herself leaning back against the wall in the dark and watching Oliver sleep. He keeps on lashing out with his legs and arms until the blankets are half tangled around him, and his wings are splayed out beneath him so he appears like a fallen avenging angel. His fever causes a layer of sweat to form a sheen across his skin, hair almost wet with it, and he’s obviously uncomfortably hot, because he’s grimacing in his slumber, fingers and lips twitching. Felicity is concerned. His body temperature reduced to approximately 102 degrees before he fell asleep, but if his fever persists above that temperature for the next few days, issues are going to arise. Losing a few hours worth of memories is not going to be the only repercussion.

Felicity snaps awake around 5am to hear Oliver making muffled, distressed noises into his pillow, wings quivering as he mumbles nonsensically, but in an agitated manner. He’s sweating so much he’s soaked the blanket thrown over him. He’s hot to the touch, and Felicity starts to panic when she takes his temperature and it reveals a fever of 103.8.

She needs to cool him down. Fast. That sort of temperature could kill him. She tries to wake him up, hitting his cheek, shaking him and even pouring a glass of water over his head, but nothing gives. Oliver stays very stubbornly unconscious. There’s no way she’s going to be able to carry him to the bathroom at the top of the stairs, especially with those massive wings hanging from his shoulderblades and weighing him down, drenched with sweat and dropping feathers as they are. There’s no shower or bath, and there’s no readily available ice. Oliver’s brain is going to boil and his organs are going to shut down if his temperature doesn’t decrease, and Felicity has no clue how she can help him. It’s only day twelve, and he could be _dying_.

Her hands shaking, she calls Diggle. Fortunately, Diggle’s entirely prepared to patiently listen to a crying IT girl whimper a vague explanation down the line and rush out with a cooler full of ice cubes. He doesn’t ask any questions about why Felicity and Oliver are sleeping so close next to each other - although he does shoot her a pointed, slightly judgemental look which has her blushing - and together, they drag Oliver out onto the training mats, plastering bags of ice all over his body and wings, urgently trying to cool him down.

They manage to get the vigilante’s temperature back down to 101. Felicity doesn’t even realise that her hands are trembling uncontrollably until Dig catches her wrists gently within his giant hands, and forces her to look up at him. “Felicity, do you want to sit down for a moment?” he asks softly. “You look as if you’re about to pass out.”

A sob escapes her before she can rein in back in, and Felicity finds herself tipping her head onto Diggle’s muscular shoulder and gripping onto his shirt for support as she whispers tearfully, “Oh god, I’m so worried about him.”

“I know,” Diggle answers somberly, encasing her in his massive arms to rub her back soothingly. “But Oliver’s going to be okay, Felicity. I promise. He’s going to get through this.”

“It’s been such an awful day.” God, she sounds wrecked. “I didn’t ever think molt could be this stressful, but I guess I was wrong. I was so scared, Dig.”

“Come and sit down,” he suggests. “You can tell me everything. I even brought wine.”

“You did?” she gasps. He moves the cooler, and lo and behind, nestled in a swath of cloth behind it to keep it reasonably cool as red wine is meant to be served, is a bottle of Pinot Noir.

“Even brought two glasses. I’m not a wine guy, but we can drink together.”

Felicity drags her eyes away from the bottle, saying weakly, “It’s - it’s six in the morning.”

“I won’t tell anybody if you don’t.”

“John Diggle, have I mentioned lately that I love you? But - platonically. In a platonic, sibling sort of way. Not in the romantic way. Not in any other way.”

They drink together, Diggle more moderately while Felicity guzzles as much of the wine as she can before starting to feel light headed and rather sick. The fuzziness in her mind caused by the alcohol prompts her to pour her heart out, telling Diggle everything that’s happened over the last dozen days and her feelings about it all. She doesn’t mention the attraction and desire she experienced whilst Oliver was lying on her lap, cuddling into her, but she can tell that Diggle knows she’s falling head over heels for the vigilante by his sympathetic expression and nodding as she rants about how unfair it is for her that Oliver just struts around shirtless, wings puffing out impressively, like a peacock.

It’s Saturday, so thankfully Felicity doesn’t have work. It’s nearing eight in the morning by the time she finishes telling Diggle about recent past events. She ends up choking down a protein granola bar that’s part of Oliver’s stash, hoping, guiltily, he won’t notice one’s missing. Diggle massages her shoulders gently as she refills her wine glass absentmindedly, not planning on drinking it, but wanting to feel the reassurance of knowing that the alcohol is there if she wants it.

“Maybe you should take a break for a few days,” he says, subtly taking away her half full wine glass from in front of her, and Felicity whines when she reaches for it to find it’s vanished. Flopping in her chair, she pouts at Diggle. “Felicity, staying with Oliver for twelve days in such an enclosed space is taking a toll on you. You need to get out and get some fresh air. Do something normal, that _isn’t_ caring for a sick, molting winged vigilante.”

“No. No, I can’t,” she protests vehemently, rising to her feet and crossing the room in a few seconds so she can stand over Oliver, watching his bare chest rise and fall weakly with a lump in her throat.

He has his arms wrapped around one of her pillows from her blow up bed, that probably has her scent on it, and he’s nuzzling into it. Felicity smiles sadly when the vigilante’s wings draw in a little closer to his spine in reflex before slumping again. They look so dismal now, feathers falling away at the smallest movement. The tiny, almost black coloured pinfeathers are coming in, erupting from his skin all over the bare patches on his wings, causing a rash that looks exceptionally sore.

She can’t care about herself, not when Oliver needs her.

“John, I promised him I wouldn’t leave him alone.”

“I’ll stay with him.”

“No, you don’t - what if he wakes up and finds that I left him here with you? He’ll freak out, Dig, he could panic and hurt you -”

“Felicity,” Diggle cuts in. She falls quiet, gazing at him uncertainly. “If you don’t want to leave him for a long time, then just take an hour or two for yourself. Oliver isn’t waking up anytime soon with that fever of his. Take the opportunity to go and take a shower, grab a few changes of clean clothes and eat a salad. I swear I will call you if it looks as if he’s going to wake up,” he adds, seeing her unease.

She pauses, asking, “Are you sure?” After spending so many days alone with the vigilante, hearing his heartfelt confessions on multiple subjects, the blonde is reluctant to leave him alone Diggle, especially after Oliver told her that his instincts don’t trust the man as much as they trust her.

“Felicity. _Go_. Oliver will be fine. We’ll be fine.”

To be honest, a shower, fresh clothes and a wilted iceberg lettuce salad sound wonderful. Felicity hasn’t washed properly in three days, only changed clothes once, and has only been eating high protein and junk food recently due to Oliver’s cravings and appetite. She’s grateful that Diggle is giving her the opportunity to get some space and personal time, but also still exceedingly worried about Oliver. In the end, however, Felicity realises that it will pay off in the long run; she feels disgusting already, and she definitely is going to need deodorant and fresh sets of clothes if she’s planning on staying with the winged vigilante through the rest of his molt without leaving the Foundry.

Entrusting Diggle with Oliver’s health and well being, Felicity heads back to her apartment. By the time she leaves, she’s mostly sober and much more clear minded, so she’s comfortable enough driving herself home. She drives by a corner shop on the way so she can buy an entire head of lettuce and a packet of bacon, and some snacks for Oliver for later on, deciding that if his protein cravings continue, they’re going to need to stock up. Never before has a shower felt so incredible, and she finds herself moaning loudly, sounding almost orgasmic as she washes her hair. She revels in the feeling of the hot water cascading down her back. Felicity groans in delight as she drinks a glass of orange juice, her first drink in the last week that isn’t water, protein shake or wine; she savors every bite of her wilted lettuce salad, making extra for her to box up and take back with her. Packing a duffle bag full of clothes, hygiene products, and food that she’s going to keep for herself (if Oliver gets his hands on her dark chocolate, she’s going to flay him, molting or not), she begins the drive back to the Foundry.

As she just turns onto the street that leads into the Glades, her cell phone rings. Felicity immediately switches on the hands-free bluetooth as soon as she glances down at the screen and sees it’s Diggle calling her, asking abruptly, “Is he waking up?”

“I think so,” Diggle responds instantly, sounding anxious. “He’s getting anxious and he’s - he’s thrashing about and yelling in his sleep. I don’t think he’s in a good mental state, Felicity. I don’t know how he’s going to react to me being here.”

“Get out of there then,” she orders. “John, he might attack you if he’s stuck in his head and doesn’t recognise you right away, and I don’t want you getting hurt. I’ll be there in five minutes.”

“Felicity, I can’t just leave you here with him alone! You have no guarantee that he won’t attack you too. If he’s truly flashing back to his childhood, when he was being experimented on - Felicity, he could _kill you_ and he would be so far retreated into his own mind he wouldn’t even know!”

She shakes her head determinedly, flinging the steering wheel around so fast as she accelerates towards her destination that the Mini Cooper’s behind swings out slightly, skidding. “I can calm him down. He won’t hurt me. He can’t.”

“What makes you think that you can get through to him in a way that I can’t?”

Felicity swallows. “Please don’t make me answer that, Dig.”

“No, I honestly need to know. I need a reassurance that I can walk away and leave you with him and won’t find you with a snapped neck when I next come check on you.”

Frustrated, she says, “I’m not aiming to hurt your feelings here, okay? This is just… truth. As hard as it is to hear. John, Oliver needs us both for very different things. You may have Oliver’s back when it comes to field, tactical and first aid affairs, but when it comes to matter of the heart and emotions, I’m the one he leans on. He finds it so hard to connect to people and understand their feelings that it exhausts him. He has trust issues up to his ears, and right now, I’m the only one he feels like he can rely on. So when I say that I’ll be able to calm him down and that I know he won’t hurt me - it’s because over the last few days, Oliver has grown to trust me implicitly. He knows that I’m not a threat to him and that I will keep him safe.”

Diggle’s silent for a moment, as if taking a few minutes to process this and accept it. Felicity chews on her lip nervously, hands clenching around the steering wheel as she finally turns onto the worn down driveway leading up to the old Queen steel factory.

“Dig, I’m here now, I’ll see you in a minute,” she says quietly.

“Sure,” he responds stiffly, before hanging up.

He meets her at the top of the stairs, regarding her with a blank expression. Felicity winces as she approaches him, but he doesn’t seem overly angry or upset after what she’s told him - in fact, he seems almost resigned. “I hope you know what you’re doing,” he says. “If you don’t call or text me in two hours to check in, I’m coming down after you, and if he hurts you in any way…”

“We’ll be okay,” Felicity informs him confidently. “Thank you for staying with him while I took a break - it was nice. I can handle it from here.”

Diggle wraps her up in a brief, warm hug that lasts a few seconds before releasing her, wishing her luck and striding off. Bracing herself, Felicity shoulders her duffle bag with a shuddering breath. What state will she find Oliver in when she goes down there? The fear coiling in her stomach is twisting her insides painfully. God, she hopes that he’s alright. There’s only one floodlight on down in the Foundry, casting looming shadows throughout the space and creating a gloomy, eerie environment. The winged vigilante is gone from the training mats. He’s awake. Felicity presumes that he’s curled up in his nest again - it’s the most likely place he will retreat, easily defensible with a good view of the entire room. The back of the blonde’s neck prickles and she glances around, legs feeling shaky beneath her; she can sense Oliver’s piercing gaze set on her, despite not being able to see him.

“Oliver?” she calls out softly.

There’s a child-like, terrified whimper. She bites her lip, blinking and winding her fingers together nervously. Moving forwards slowly, Felicity keeps her tread light and careful as she advances towards where she knows the nest is situated.

“It’s okay, Oliver. You’re safe now. Dig’s gone. It’s just you and me down here,” she whispers. “Just you and me.”

 

A loud crunch sounds from beneath her foot. Felicity lifts her foot in shock to see what looks like a massive black primary flight feather lying on the ground, the quill now crumbled and filaments torn. Her gaze snaps upwards when a barely audible whine echoes through the space. Finally, she’s able to catch sight of the winged vigilante, and all the oxygen rushes out of her lungs, tears pricking at the corners of her eyes.

Oliver is curled up in a tight ball with his giant, quivering wings which look so dismally bare and thin around him, the top of his head being the only thing visible amongst the grey feathers. His entire body is trembling, tiny sobs escaping from his throat. As Felicity takes a cautious step forwards him, he flinches violently, as if he can feel her foot falls vibrate through his form, and his sobs grow even louder.

And throughout all of this, he’s still desperately clutching the octahedron Rubik's cube she gifted him with to his chest.

Felicity shakes her head, horrified at seeing him looking and sounding so distraught and terrified. This is a side of Oliver that she’s never seen before. She’d seen him on the fringe of this state when he’d first broken down on her yesterday, but this… this is pure devastation. Pure agony.

“Oliver, hey,” Felicity murmurs, plastering on a wobbly, sad smile as she kneels down. She stays a few feet away from him just because he’s shaking so much, flinching away. “Hey, it’s okay. You’re safe. You’re here in the Foundry with me.”

A tense beat passes, and then Oliver raises his head, staring at her fearfully with red rimmed, shining cobalt eyes. “ _Fe-li-ci-ty_?” he chokes out.

“Yeah, it’s me.” She tries to shift closer but he whimpers, pulling away. Now she is nearer to the vigilante, however, Felicity can examine his flushed, heated face and the sweat soaking his hair and dripping from the tips. His fever had definitely risen. She needs to get him calmed and then cooled down. “Oliver, do you feel sick?” He nods, gulping. “Can I come a little closer?”

He shakes his head forcefully. “I d-don’t want to hurt you.”

“Why would you hurt me?” she asks, voice low and soothing. A pinched, somewhat haunted expression sweeps over his face, and he turns away, squeezing his eyes shut. His wings unfurl around him, but only slightly, revealing the barren undersides, where feathers have molted but the pinfeathers haven’t emerged. She questions gently, “Did you have a nightmare, Oliver?” He nods. “About - about where you grew up?” He nods again, lifting a hand to his mouth to muffle his crying. In his emotional, vulnerable state, this night terror is seriously affecting him. “You know that’s over now. You’re never going to go through anything like that ever again. I won’t allow that to happen, Oliver. As long as you’re with me, you’re safe. I promise.”

Without any warning, he heaves another sob and throws himself at her. The vigilante virtually tackles Felicity to the ground, burying his face in her shoulder as he embraces her desperately, yearning for comfort. It's a stark reminder of how they met initially for Felicity, as she remembers how he’d bowled her over and sent her sprawling then as well.

“You said you wouldn’t leave me and you left!” he cries out, wings flaring and then tucking around both of them, resting over Felicity’s back possessively.

“Oh, Oliver,” she whispers, cupping the back of his head and trailing circles over the bare skin there. “I’m so sorry, Oliver. I didn’t mean to be gone for long. I just had to go and shower and get some clean clothes. I was always planning on coming back. I told you that I wasn’t going to abandon you and I swear, I never will.”

“Please don’t leave again!”

“I’m not leaving you. Shh. It’s okay. I’m right here.”

Felicity loses count of how many minutes they spend lying on the floor, tangled together as Oliver clings to her, crying softly as he hugs her. She closes her eyes and clears her thoughts, focusing only on the warm contact between them as she absentmindedly draws code on the vigilante’s lower back, over the severe burn scars, brushing the fingers of her other hand over the very few remaining coverts. She frowns at the prickly, rough feeling of the pinfeathers covering a large expanse of the skin. As her back begins stiffening up, becoming sore due the hardness and coldness of the floor, she tugs on Oliver’s hand, suggesting quietly that they move to his nest and grab a quick protein shake. She doesn’t want it to reach the point where they have to insert a IV again, as it looks like the vigilante ripped out the one that she and Diggle put in early. The wound has already clotted on his wrist, but Felicity cleans it quickly with a little antiseptic anyway so it doesn't get infected. 

Oliver’s scarily silent as Felicity helps him move to his blanket and pillow nest and then moving around to grab food, ice packs and painkillers. She scoops up his octahedron Rubik's from where it sits, abandoned on the floor from when he lunged up to hug her, and presses it into the vigilante’s trembling hands. Once he’s hesitantly eating cereal bars, sipping on a shake, and has multiple cold compresses bringing down his raging body temperature, she settles down cross legged beside him. Thinking that it’ll assist in calming him down, Felicity grabs the spray bottle, this time only filling it with water so that she can spray his hair and wash out the sweat. He moans around the straw of his protein shake and leans into her touch, so she knows it’s appreciated; therefore, she goes on to wipe down his bare shoulders, chest and then his back, between his wings, as well. She insists on maintaining a serious, impassive expression as she does so, refusing to allow herself to get flustered as she gently wipes away the sweat over his abdominals, extremely close to his low riding sweatpants. Now’s not the time to blush.

“Do you want me to do your wings as well?” she questions. Considering how even now he’s drawing back from her touch, it’ll be better to ask rather than do it without permission.

“No thank you,” he answers, voice almost a whisper. He’s weak due to the fever, as harmless as a kitten. “They’re - they’re sensitive right now. Always are when - when pinfeathers come through. When the secondaries and primaries start molting.”

“Oliver.” She draws his attention and he blinks up at her blearily, swallowing. “What do you need? I want to help you, but I don’t want to overstep any of your boundaries. Tell me what you need me to do and I will do it.”

The vigilante sniffs, one trembling hand lifting up feebly to wipe sweat from his forehead. It’s so hard to associate the hard warrior she’d first been introduced to with this more reserved, shy version of Oliver. She supposes that’s the result of years of neglect, experimentation and abuse. The molting has brought that all up to the surface, and the crust has cracked to allow it all to spill over whilst he’s in a safe environment. Right now, she isn’t dealing with fierce, vigilante Oliver. She’s dealing with lost, lonely, ill Oliver.

“Could you just… come and lie down with me?” he asks timidly. “Please?”

“Well, because you said please,” she smiles teasingly, scooting closer until she’s resting beside him, dragging a pillow over to cushion her head. If physical contact is what Oliver needs to feel secure, she’s certainly willing to give him a little cuddle.

Oliver immediately shuffles closer and folds himself over her, propping his chin on top of her shoulder and straining his left wing into the air so he can beat it once, freeing any stray loose feathers, before laying it over Felicity’s body like a blanket. Felicity grimaces, the heat he’s emitting from his fevered body washing over her like a wave.

He snuffles contently, gazing up at her with doleful blue eyes. “Thank you,” he mumbles. 

“Oh, a please _and_ a thank you from you today?” she jokes, before growing serious. She turns over so she braces herself on her elbow, looking down at him with a grin. Oliver’s eyes widen, and he looks like a deer in the headlights as Felicity decides to throw caution to the wind and press a tender, affectionate kiss to his salty, hot forehead. “Oliver, all you have to do is ask,” she says sincerely. “I’m your _friend_. I care about you. Your happiness makes me happy.”

Oliver stares at her for a moment, breathing heavily as if he can’t believe what he’s hearing her say - as if she’s dropped out of Heaven and landed in front of him like a miracle. Felicity rubs her thumb fondly over his bicep, smiling, but then the vigilante’s wings are arching behind him, Oliver is leaning forwards towards her with intent and determination in his eyes and -

_He’s kissing her._

Holy shit _OLIVER IS KISSING HER._

A deep, enticing feeling blossoms within her aching chest and Felicity’s eyes snap open so wide they’re as round as plates. That flame flickering in her abdomen flares, and she finds her eyes fluttering shut and reciprocating the kiss with just as much passion. Oliver tries to flip their positions, cradling an arm under her back so he can twist and loom over her, pressing his sweaty chest to hers as he hardens the kiss. His tongue traces her lips, hesitantly asking permission. His wings tower above them both, half flared and all the remaining feathers fluffed up; there’s a flush spreading down his neck that’s very similar to the blush on her own.

Felicity’s mind goes fuzzy and she loses herself in the moment as the vigilante’s calloused hands stroke down her back gently. Oh god, she could get used to this. His lips caress her own with a sense of passion and desperation, electrifying her senses to a delicious frenzy, but then the blonde clicks to attention, realising that oh, god, they really should not be doing this. Felicity’s supposed to be his best friend, and he’s emotionally fragile, and she can mentally list about another hundred reasons why it was wrong. But his lips are _fantastic_ and stopping is definitely not as appealing as continuing a, frankly, amazing kiss.

She finds it in herself to break away with a haggard gasp. " _Oliver_ ," she breathes out, in a rough murmur.

But before she can say more, or Oliver can reply, his eyes roll into the back of his head and the vigilante passes out on top of her.

She freezes, inhales shuddering, licking her swollen lips. Before she can stress herself out too much, she checks his temperature. High. Much higher than before. If her judgement is correct, Oliver’s temperature is nearing 103. She’ll need to get a cold compress for him again soon, but for now - she’s too dazed to move. Her mind is spinning too quickly for her to feel steady enough to get up. Not to mention that Oliver is _heavy_. And since he’s unconscious on top of her - she’s going to have to shove him off anyway. And right now… she doesn’t want to do that.

Felicity blinks up at the ceiling in astonishment, attempting to get her head around what just happened. “Oh my god,” she whispers. “What the _fuck_ am I meant to do now?”

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading, hoped you enjoyed reading!
> 
>  **Game for the comments!** Oliver's going through his molt and will end up with a new snazzy pair of wings afterwards, with possibly different coloured plumage. What colour do you think his new plumage might be?
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13, @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A shorter chapter as I warned last time. Thank you for all your unwavering support, it's really helping me right now. You're all wonderful people, and every time I read your comments, I just feel immensely validated. Also, quick thing. If anybody is willing to make some art or sketch winged!Oliver, I'll give them spoilers for the colours of Oliver's new plumage ;)
> 
> Thank you once to again to the amazing Becky, @nvwhovian, for beta-ing.
> 
> Game for the comments!: Lance makes an appearance later on in this fic. How do you think he reacts to Oliver?

* * *

* * *

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, turn.

Repeat.

Felicity’s horrifically conflicted, hence why she’s pacing back and forth across the Foundry, running a hand over her face concernedly. It’s Sunday, day thirteen. Oliver is still unconscious, lying on his side with his wings curled up behind him in his nest, in the exact same position he landed in once Felicity had pushed him off her with a squeak that morning. And thank god for that, because the blonde is not mentally prepared to have any sort of sensible, coherent conversation with him, especially not after what happened last night.

Oliver kissed her.

It was an incredible kiss. Let it be noted that the winged vigilante is certainly a very talented, very enthusiastic kisser, and it isn’t as if Felicity didn’t enjoy it. In fact, she enjoyed it a little too much. She and Oliver are friends. Best friends. And best friends did not kiss each other. At least - not in that sort of way. A romantic way. A sexual way. If that’s even what it was.

Oh god, her mind is tearing itself apart diving into the details of this.

After an emotional day, Oliver was seeking out comfort in any form possible. He clung to her because she was the only person he trusts that was there. Felicity has to wonder for a moment whether it was just the fact that she was _there_ that he decided to kiss her. If he’s been withholding all of that sexual tension he’s been experiencing, every single intimate desire he’s ever had in his life, then maybe last night and the affection which was exchanged between them had triggered it to be released.

But Oliver isn’t _like_ that. He’s been in his right mind… as far as she’s been able to tell. Although the vigilante passed out afterwards from exhaustion and fever, he was very much aware during the kiss.

No, Oliver kissed Felicity; his questionable deliriousness in the situation doesn’t matter. He _kissed her_. And Felicity _liked it_.

She’s attracted to Oliver. She isn’t going to lie. He’s handsome, and charming in some strange way. He’s strong, and brave, and kind, and Felicity can’t think of any reason why she _wouldn’t_ feel attraction towards him. And because he kissed her… does that mean that Oliver is attracted to her as well?

But that doesn’t make any sense. Sure, Felicity knew she was pretty - she can clean up very nicely, and if she wears the right dress and styles her hair, she can make every male (and occasionally female) head in the room turn her way. But Oliver is different. He wasn’t raised as a normal human being, didn’t experience childhood. Felicity isn’t even sure if this Sara he’s talked about before was just a friend or something more. Feeling attraction is probably not new to him, but acting upon it? He might have kissed her because he’s confused by his feelings.

Felicity’s falling in love with the winged crusader. If Oliver doesn’t understand human emotions, can’t process or understand them… can he even comprehend love? Lust is instinctual, something that everybody feels, but love… is love beyond him?

No. Oliver feels love. There is an incontestable degree of _love_ between the three of them on the team. Brotherly love between Oliver and Diggle, the love that’s felt between comrades in war. Felicity’s sure that over the last few weeks, she and Diggle have developed a sibling dynamic built on brotherly-sisterly love.

But romantic love?

That’s an entirely different story.

“Felicity!”

She yelps, jumping almost two feet into the air. Whipping around, she snatches up a plastic knife which was left over from a Big Belly Burger delivery a few days ago, and aims it at the intruder. Diggle raises an eyebrow and surveys her with an unimpressed, yet amused, look. Sighing in relief, Felicity lowers her hand, bringing the other one up to try and tame her bed head, and also to hide her trembling. She didn't even hear their partner enter the Foundry, and usually the stairs are clunky and noisy. She must have been very out of it to zone out and miss hearing that.

“Plastic knife?” Diggle says. “Really?”

“Nearest possible weapon,” she replies defensively.

“You expected to be able to defend yourself… with a plastic knife,” he deadpans.

“These things can do major damage!” Felicity insists, waving the utensil in the air.

When Diggle snickers at her, the blonde stabs it into his chest lightly to prove her point. The man just rolls his eyes, gently pushing her wrist away. “Okay, girl, put it down.”

She drops it with a frustrated noise, and it clatters onto the counter. “I don’t mean to be rude, Dig, but… what are you doing here? I texted you yesterday; you didn’t need to come down.”

Diggle huffs unhappily. “A single text in caps lock stating, ‘I’m fine’, insinuates the exact _opposite_ of fine, Felicity.”

Ah. The frantic text to Diggle she sent after managing to wriggle underneath the heavy winged vigilante to fish her cell phone out of her back pocket. Diggle gave her two hours to send the text before coming back down, and she sent it with two minutes to spare.

“The capslock was by accident?” she offers weakly.

“You forgot all grammar as well,” he says. “And you _never_ forget your grammar.”

“It was late. I was tired.”

“Fine,” Diggle shrugs. “Keep convincing yourself of that. The Queens gave me a day off babysitting Thea duty, so I decided I might as well come down. I thought you might appreciate breakfast.”

He has indeed brought along breakfast, four blueberry and oat muffins as well as a high protein strawberry yoghurt that was meant for Oliver. Felicity nods awkwardly, thanking him quietly and smiling as she takes her muffin and orange juice carton. She goes to sit down her her chair but angles herself towards the slumbering vigilante, keeping an alert eye on him should he suddenly wake up. Diggle hops up onto the stool opposite her, dropping the breakfast bag onto the counter with a thud.

“I love you so much for this,” Felicity sighs, biting into the muffin and quietly groaning as a blueberry bursts in her mouth.

“You’re welcome.” As he observes her stuffing another large piece of the baked good in her mouth, Diggle questions, “How long has it been since you’ve had a piece of fruit?”

“God only knows,” she manages to say around her mouthful. “I think I’ve already gained several pounds because of all the Big Belly we’ve been eating.”

Diggle laughs softly, and pauses, letting the silence settle for a moment before he asks, changing the subject, “So how’d it go last night after I left?”

Felicity finds herself blushing as his words ‘last night’ conjured up memories of Oliver’s warm lips passionately slotting over hers. She coughs, trying to hide the heat in her cheeks by focusing only on the last few crumbs of her muffin. “Fine!” Felicity answers hastily, but her voice comes out as a high, strained squeak. “Fine, it all went fine. Com _pletely_ normal. Yep.”

She _definitely_ sounds convincing.

“Really?”

She nods fiercely. “Calmed Oliver down and then we both went to sleep. Yup. That’s what happened.”

Diggle quirks an eyebrow, questioning suspiciously, “Nothing else happened?”

“Nope! Nothing - nothing else. Just sleeping together.” When Diggle blinks at her, eyes wide, the blonde starts to panic. “ _NO_ , that’s not what I - not _sleeping_ together, just… sleeping next to each other! Totally normal sleeping. Nothing else.”

“Felicity, you’re digging yourself into a hole,” Diggle smiles sympathetically.

“I know, but I can’t seem to stop myself,” she mutters.

“If it helps,” he says. “I’ll remind you that when you modified our set up down here… you linked the network and server to our home systems and smart phones.”

“Yes,” she nods. “Yes, I did do that.”

“Right. So… I can access the Foundry CCTV live whenever I want.” He pauses, adding, “And past footage as well.” He shoots her a very pointed look, crossing his arms. “So I’ll ask again, Felicity. How did it go after I left last night?”

Realisation slams into her, heavy as a train, and Felicity feels her whole body jolt into a state of shock. Why would Dig say that unless… She drops her head into shaking hands with a groan, shoulders sinking as she mumbles, “No, no, no… this can’t be happening.”

Diggle saw the Foundry CCTV tapes from last night, most likely wanting to check up on her and Oliver, and instead and instead… saw the two of them kissing.

“Felicity -”

“I - I can explain,” she splutters, but Diggle lifts a steady hand, cutting her off.

“Felicity,” he says calmly, standing and beginning to stalk around the Foundry to scoop up discarded, shed feathers from the ground. “Both you and Oliver are adults. There has been a degree of sexual tension between you two for several weeks now, and you were acting upon it. As long as the kiss was consenting and safe, I do not care that it happened.” Going still for a moment, he raises his gaze to meet hers with intense eyes and continues, “Although from what it looked like on that tape, you were not expecting it. Considering that he passed out on top of you after it, it must have been a bit of a shock - and alarming.”

“He took me by surprise,” Felicity admits, running a hand through her hair and avoiding making eye contact.

“Yeah,” he chuckles. “I could tell by the look of absolute astonishment on your face.”

“I’m - I’m sorry you had to see that. Not exactly the evening entertainment you wanted.” Diggle snorts at that. “I - I don’t really know how it happened. I don’t even know whether or not Oliver was aware of what he was doing at it time.”

“Oh, trust me, he was aware,” Diggle mutters under his breath.

“It was such a good kiss,” Felicity says wistfully, leaning back in her chair and swivelling around with a small smile. “I don’t know what I expected it to be like, but it was _incredible_.”

“Little bit too much information.”

“Seriously, it was _amazing_. I had _no_ idea somebody could do that with their tongue -”

“Alright!” Diggle interrupts loudly. “That’s enough information, thank you, Felicity! If I wanted to know what it was like kissing Oliver, I would do it myself. But I think, for the time being, I’ll leave that to you.”

She ducks her head in a grin, chuckling at having flustered the man so much. However, a seriousness sweeps over her as she ponders on the kiss a bit longer. “Dig, do you think… do you think Oliver will remember it?”

“What makes you think that he won’t?” Diggle questions, tilting his head.

Felicity spills. She tells him all about the events of the previous morning, informing him of how Oliver broke down on her but then later on, after waking up in the evening, seemed to have mysteriously forgotten everything. Her partner takes it all in his stride, occasionally interrupting with short questions about clarifying certain things the vigilante couldn’t remember, but as she rambles on, Diggle only seems to grow more troubled.

After she’s finished, Diggle rubs at his eyes with a sigh, admitting, “He’s obviously experiencing some fever-induced amnesia, so to be honest, because of that, I’m leaning towards him unfortunately not remembering your kiss.”

Crestfallen, Felicity mumbles, “Yeah, that’s what I thought.”

“I wouldn’t presume, though,” he offers. “Ask him about it when he wakes up and he’s coherent enough. He might not remember the actual act of kissing you, but he’s not going to forget those feelings that triggered him to do so in the first place.”

“I - I don’t think he has feelings towards _me_ specifically,” Felicity says quietly.

“I could list thirty seven reasons why you’re wrong about that.”

“Thirty seven?”

“Yep.”

“Thirty seven specifically?”

“Give me five minutes and I’ll be able to come up with thirty seven more.”

She snorts, glancing away. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” she mutters.

Diggle fixes her with a stern, intense gaze. “Felicity Smoak, you should know that I have suffered through many, many evenings and nights as the awkward third wheel, forced to remain quiet while you and Oliver did your weird version of flirting at each other. The sexual tension has built to an almost unbearable level. I’m practically an expert on the relationship between two at this point.”

“You’re hilarious,” Felicity says, maintaining a blank expression despite her amusement at his little speech.

Silence falls after that, but it’s not awkward; it’s the two of them enjoying each other’s company without Oliver as a buffer between them, finally getting to spend some more time together that isn’t infringed upon by a broody, winged vigilante. Oliver remains conked out, blissfully unaware of the surrounding world, so the two of them settle on tidying up the Foundry for the rest of the day, because right now, it’s a complete state. Oliver hasn’t exactly been in the right state of mind to keep things neat and tidy as he usually likes them, but the space is a complete mess, with dirty plastic cups for the protein shakes, plastic plates and cutlery, and boxes and trash from take out littered everywhere. There’s a blanket of feathers as well; due his his unconsciousness lately, Oliver hasn’t had the chance to collect them all up and order them, so Felicity and Diggle end up having to sweep the molted feathers up too, dumping them in a bag for a later date. 

They talk to each other about their lives in ways they never got the chance to before, Felicity learning about Diggle’s brother and, to her shock, ex-wife, while the bodyguard is educated on her Vegas background. They eat homemade salads together (thank the Lord, Felicity never thought that she could ever be sick of Big Belly Burger, but she somehow is now) and then, in the evening, decide that if they’ve got to get anything done, it’s the feather sorting. Oliver’s going to be massively behind in the sorting and bagging of his shed feathers if he does wake up within the next few days. If he’s miraculously lucid when he does awaken, he’s going to be very frustrated finding that out. They might as well try and help him by getting the pile of feathers they have sitting in the corner halved.

Turns out, it’s harder than they originally thought.

There are over _thirty thousand_ feathers.

Did Oliver warn them of this?

No.

Is feather sorting the most frustrating, depressing task Felicity has ever partaken in?

Yes. Yes, it is.

Sitting on the floor and trying to map out all the secondary coverts so she can label them, Felicity holds up a peppered grey feather helplessly. “Dig, is this secondary covert three, or four?”

Diggle peers over from where he’s perched on a chair, with all the primary coverts dumped in a pile in front of him. “Isn’t that covert number seven?”

Frustrated, she holds up another peppered feather, completely identical to the last one. “I thought this was seven.”

“No, that’s got a little band of lighter grey at the bottom. That’s got to be nine or ten.”

“But these two are nine and ten!”

“I thought those two were five and six.”

Dropping it, Felicity mutters, “And I thought that kiss was confusing. How the fuck does Oliver get any of these in the correct order? They all look the same!”

“Beats me,” Diggle says, throwing his hands up in exasperation as the feathers he’s lining up don’t match. “I don’t know how he does this for hours on end either. It’s been barely forty minutes and I already want to throw in the towel.”

“Maybe we’re doing it wrong,” Felicity says, standing so she can skip back across the room with a handful of coverts, crouching down to compare them to Oliver’s limp, thinning wings.

Diggle frowns as he watches her compare the coverts to the ones that are currently still hanging on by the quills. “Actually, that’s not a bad idea. Spread his wings out a little. We might be able to figure out the order faster if we can see where the feathers have molted from.”

He brings his own bagful of feathers over and they both settle down beside the unconscious vigilante, Felicity reaching out to gently spread out the wings behind him. Oliver shifts slightly on his side, as if uncomfortable, but he arches his wings out some more as he stretches out with a quiet groan in a somewhat helpful manner, exposing the undersides of the top one to the two of them. 

Felicity’s heart lurches as Diggle extends a hand to brush a loose secondary off the wing, and her hand spears forwards to grasp firmly around his wrist, yanking his fingers away from the delicate appendages.

“Don’t,” she warns. “I don’t think he’ll like it if he finds out you touched his wings without his permission.”

Diggle rolls his eyes. “I won’t touch the pretty, Felicity.”

“The pretty?”

“His pretty wings, which you are enamoured with.”

“I’m not _enamoured_ with them.”

“Seem awfully fond of touching them to not be enamoured.”

“Dig!” she splutters, blushing.

Just because they’re extremely soft and rather fascinating, especially due to their colour pattern and largeness - not to mention the fact that the wings’ owner is incredibly handsome - doesn’t mean she’s ‘enamoured’. She only touches them when they need grooming, or molted feathers need to be cleared away… or when Oliver asks her to.

“Just teasing you,” he grins. “Here, do you think this covert slots in with this one on the right or left better?”

Remarkably, the two of them manage to sort out most of the feathers. They work together to manipulate Oliver’s limp wings gently into different positions so they can compare the shed coverts that have dropped to the sparse few still hanging on by the quill. It’s at this point that Felicity realises that some tiny, feathery stubs are beginning to emerge from the pin feathers. The little puffs are jet black in colour, although that may just be due to the high blood circulation within them. Oliver’s molt is progressing, and she’s relieved. He said some days ago that once the first several feathers poked out from the pins, the rate of all the other feathers molting and being replaced would increase.

When evening arrives, Diggle elects to stay overnight with them, mostly because Oliver needs to be put back onto an amino acid and sucrose IV, and he’ll need to monitor it. They were both hoping that he would wake up at some point, but now they know that he’s bound to continue sleeping through the night, it’s become vital they put him back on fluids. It’s going to be especially important if the molt rate intensifies, as he’ll need all the protein he can get.

They watch a _Terminator_ movie before bedding down, Diggle eyeing her with a knowing look when Felicity settles down beside Oliver on her air mattress. Felicity ignores him; she’s far too worried about keeping watch over the winged vigilante, making sure his fever doesn’t rise too much, to care about the fact that he’s essentially half naked and she’s going to be sleeping next to him… similar to how they spent the night before, but this time, not with him on top of her.

During the night, Oliver only wakes once. He’s too delirious to speak coherently, his fever dangerously high - so high that they have to cover him in half a dozen instant ice packs from Diggle’s medical kit. After the vigilante tries to rip out the IV a couple of times, Diggle has to pin down his hands loosely to the ground, while Felicity attempts to stop the frantic, sloppy flapping of his wings. She grimaces when she gets a mouthful of dry feathers, but at least he eventually calms down. Throughout his frenzied episode, however, there is one singular word that makes sense in his hysterical babbles.

Oliver calls Felicity’s name. Repeatedly.

She never knew that he could express so much emotion, so many sentences, in four syllables. When Oliver slurs and cries out her name, Felicity can hear so much more than just that.

She hears _I’m scared help me_ , and _where are you I want you_. She hears _why are you holding me down_ and _I don’t understand_.

She knows that Diggle can’t, which is most likely why he looks confused when Felicity starts crying after Oliver stutters out, “ **Felicity** ,” when he really means, _don’t touch me I’m frightened you’re scaring me_ , jerking underneath them weakly.

At one point, Oliver is breathing so shakily and heavily that Felicity worries that he might hyperventilate himself into unconsciousness. He’s slipping into a panicky, anxiety attack stricken state. He starts muttering all sorts of negatives under his breath, pleading and crying, as if he’s trapped in a horrific nightmare about the facility he was raised in.

Eventually the winged vigilante falls back into a restless slumber, thirty foot wingspan spread out across the floor and blankets from his nest strewn all over the place, because of his flailing. Felicity doesn’t care about boundaries anymore, not when she’s so terribly concerned about him and her heart is clenching due to emotional pain every few seconds, creating twinges in her chest. Once they maneuver Oliver onto his side, one wing tucked behind him while the other curls around him like a blanket, Felicity crawls up close to him. She takes his hand in her own, squeezing it tenderly, and without any hesitation, she buries her other hand in the thinning sea of peppered feathers. The bare alula of that wing wraps around her fingers possessively, squeezing tightly. The vigilante relaxes considerably, sighing as the tension drains out of him at her touch.

“I’ve got you,” she whispers, gently stroking over the feathers.

In his sleep, Oliver tucks his head into her chest, mumbling, “ _Fe-li-ci-ty_.”

“I’m here,” she soothes.

Oliver shifts, wings quivering, but he slips off into a deeper unconsciousness, to her relief.

“Playing with fire, Felicity,” Diggle whispers, as he sinks down to lie on a training mat, blanket pulled over him. “You’re going to get yourself burned.”

“You only get burned if you don’t know how to control the flames,” she murmurs back, gaze fixed onto Oliver’s tensed, pained expression. He can’t even reach peace in his sleep anymore, plagued by nightmares triggered by the fever and his vulnerable state. “And I learnt a hell of a lot about how to use Bunsen burners when I was younger, Dig.”

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos and comment :)
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13, @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar
> 
>  **Game for the comments!** : Lance makes an appearance later on in this fic. How do you think he reacts to Oliver?


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And back with Chapter 5. This is probably one of my favourite chapters of this fic.
> 
> No beta this chapter. I thought I'd give Becky a break because currently I'm bugging her twice a week lol. A massive thank you to Bev, @felicityollies, for creating an [awesome aesthetic for the fic](http://felicityollies.tumblr.com/post/164460577552/birds-of-a-feather-by-alexiablackbriar13) on Tumblr! It was amazing and I love it x
> 
> Thank you all once again for all your incredible support. I really appreciate all your comments and kind words on Twitter and Tumblr.
> 
> Warning: This chapter is rated M for... reasons.

* * *

The rest of the night seems to drag itself out, mostly because Felicity finds it difficult to get back to sleep. She keeps getting distracted by staring at Oliver’s lips, slipping back into those vivid, exhilarating memories, while grooming his wings. Monday morning can’t come quickly enough, which is truly saying something - she usually despises Mondays.

Work is unavoidable, unfortunately, for both her and Diggle. Diggle has to go and work several hours bodyguarding for Thea Queen, and then run security at a Queen family event, and Felicity has to return to her tedious, unexciting life as an IT girl.

Seeing as the vigilante managed to fight his way back to consciousness last night and became quite agitated, the two of them decide, with guilty consciences, that keeping Oliver on an IV with a small amount of sedative is the best thing to do in the circumstances. That way, he won’t wake up without one of them there to supervise and look after him, and he won’t accidentally hurt himself. Felicity is reluctant to leave, gazing back longingly to where Oliver is curled up in his corner nest as she stands at the bottom of the stairs. She knows, however, that the sooner she goes to work, the sooner she can finish off her projects and get back to him.

Work is a nightmare. Felicity can’t concentrate properly, her mind always straying back to thinking about Oliver, alone and sick, down in the Foundry. In the end, she decides that enough is enough - she can’t go through a week of having to spend nine hours a day in a cramped little office cubicle, separated from the vigilante, when she knows he’s going through such a stressful, arduous experience. She talks to her supervisor and then to HR, asking if it’s possible she could work at home for the rest of the week. She claims that at the moment, one of her close relatives is ill and she needs to be free during the daytime to look after them. They are sympathetic to her, and say that if she completes half of her coding work for the week today, she doesn’t have to come back to the office until next Monday.

It’s the exact motivation Felicity needs. She’s been given an objective - and she’s setting out to complete not just half of her week’s coding work today, but all of it. It’s why she ends up not leaving Queen Consolidated until eight at night. She’s exhausted, overworked, and her brain hurts, but all of her projects are finished and ready to be submitted. Now, she can spend the rest of the week focused solely on Oliver and aiding him through the last dredges of his molt, without worrying about work.

The only bad thing about this arrangement is that because she finishes work so late, she’s late turning up to the Foundry. Diggle texted her around five to say that he would be there at six, which means that he’s spent two hours alone with the winged vigilante. If Oliver woke up during those two hours… Felicity suspects that he would not have been happy. She rushes back to the Foundry, diverting once on route so she can swing around to Diggle’s house to pick up a box of amino acid IV bags, a ‘gift’ from his ‘friend at ARGUS’.

When she finally arrives, Felicity exhales in relief as she is greeted with the sight of Diggle munching on some potato chips while watching _The Bourne Identity_. Everything seems fine.

The IT girl is interrupted in her walking across the room to dump the medical supplies on the counter by Diggle muttering matter-of-factly, “Your half-plucked pigeon is awake.”

She goes still. It’s certainly an unusual nickname for Oliver, but it’s recognisable. “How is he? Did he freak out seeing you here?”

“He's been fine actually, as long as I stay well away from him. He’s mostly just sat in his nest playing with that Rubik's you got him. Did you get my text?”

Frowning, Felicity checks her phone. She accidentally switched it to mute earlier, so her phone didn't ping to notify her of the new text.

_FROM: John Diggle:_  
_You need to bring more changes of clothes down here if you’re planning on staying the rest of the week._

That doesn't make any sense - she told him yesterday that she’s already brought a week’s worth of clean clothing with her. She doesn't need anymore. Reminding him of such in a confused tone, Diggle simply shakes his head in amusement and points over at Oliver’s corner.

Felicity almost chokes on air, knees going weak as she thinks she sees where exactly her spare clothes for the next week have gone, and what they're being used for. Making a faint sound of shock, she creeps closer and - yes, Oliver has taken all of her clothes and is utilising them as bedding for his corner nest.

He’s clutching one of her hoodies to his chest, wings beautifully ruffled with her t-shirts tangled around the massive limbs. She inhales sharply with a shudder as that tantalizing heat pools in her abdomen once again, although she has no idea why - Oliver’s not doing anything particularly invigorating, nothing that should arouse her, and yet seeing him gripping onto her clothes possessively excites her - very, very much.

The winged vigilante's half asleep, absentmindedly fumbling with his now half completed octahedron Rubik's. After noticing Felicity frozen in place for a few seconds, Oliver raises his head dazedly, muttering in a bemused, exhausted voice, “Felicity?”

Shaking herself out of her trance, the blonde squashes that heat down as much as possible and moves forwards to kneel on the edges of Oliver’s nest. Her lips tick up in a smile when he closes his eyes and purrs as she runs one hand gently through his hair. He huffs, reaching out with one hand, eyes half lidded.

“Hey,” Felicity greets him softly. “How’re you feeling?”

“My wings hurt,” he complains.

She has to fight back her sigh of relief. He’s coherent. This bout of lucidity could most likely be the only one for the rest of Oliver’s molt, so Felicity has to make it count.

“What do you remember about the last few days?” she asks worriedly.

Oliver looks stricken.

“You don’t remember anything, do you?”

He shakes his head unhappily.

Felicity’s heart sinks and she exhales with a shudder, glancing away to hide the brimming tears in her eyes. Great. Fan-freaking-tastic. Oliver doesn’t remember their kiss at all. Felicity’s now certain the universe is conspiring against her. Stupid universe.

“That’s okay,” she manages to answer, keeping the emotional wobble out of her voice. She gently scratches at the nape of Oliver’s neck to calm him, as he’s distressed by the thought of having short-term amnesia, as anybody would be. “We talked about forgetting stuff last time, yeah? You’re just ill and feverish. You’ll get better.”

“I had a dream,” Oliver mutters quietly.

“A nightmare?”

“No, it was…” He jerks his head as if he’s confused. “Never mind.”

Hope scratches at Felicity’s insides. So maybe the vigilante’s subconscious does partly remember the kiss. Maybe not as a proper memory, and only as a dream, but that’s at least _something_. “Do you wanna talk about it?”

He shakes his head, declining with his brow furrowed.

Aching with disappointment, Felicity smiles sadly and replies, “That’s okay. Now, while you’re awake, is there anything you want?”

“Diggle’s here,” the vigilante grumbles, his wings flaring and tucking as he shifts. “I want him to leave.”

“He's not bothering you,” she admonishes, withdrawing her fingers from his hair and stifling a chuckle when the vigilante groans, leaning back into her hand. It draws Felicity’s attention back to his nest - or specifically, what his nest is made out of. “Something you want to tell me?” She raises an eyebrow.

Oliver frowns. Felicity looks pointedly down at all of her clothes making up the nest, and the vigilante goes red.

He shifts guiltily, but plasters a fake innocent expression on his flushed face, saying, “Dunno what you’re talking about.”

Felicity crosses her arms and taps her foot impatiently on the floor, asking in a calm, yet deadpan tone, “Really?” When he averts his gaze from hers, attempting to look as if he has no idea what she’s talking about, she very carefully takes hold of his chin, turning his face towards her, and he immediately blushes, wings fluffing up in embarrassment. “Because to me, it looks as if you’ve stolen some stuff belonging to me for your nest.”

“Didn’t steal it,” he protests, tightening his grasp around her hoodie. “Just… borrowed without permission.” She rolls her eyes and reaches out to take it back from him, and jumps in surprise when Oliver unleashes a fierce, possessive growl. “Mine.”

“Actually, it’s mine,” she tries.

But the vigilante seems to have decided his word is the final say, because he struggles to sit up, and then turns over onto his front so all of her clothes are buried beneath his sweaty, half naked body. The massive wings flare out before tucking, collapsing against his back. In a childish show of defiance, Oliver ignores her. Even when Felicity brushes her hand up against his shoulder blade, or trails her fingertips over his back, he barely reacts, flinching minutely and huffing. She anticipated this sort of behaviour, with him blanking her, if they ever had an argument, but she didn’t anticipate how much it would hurt. She frowns, shooting a glare back at Diggle when he snorts at the vigilante’s poor manners.

“Fine,” she says, almost a snap. “Keep my clothes. But don’t expect me to salad-dress and groom your feathers anytime soon.”

She begins marching away, but Oliver’s hand shoots out to snag her ankle. Yelping, Felicity almost trips over; she wheels back to scold him firmly, but the winged vigilante just releases a whine, aiming wide, bright blue eyes at her. “Nooo. Come lie down with me.”

“Oliver, Dig is here,” she reminds him quietly, biting her lip with a smile.

He shakes his head. “I don’t caaaaare,” he groans. “Please come lie down? And please groom my wings. They’re all itchy and achy and hurt-y, Felicity.”

“Excuse me, mister, what did I just say? You took my clothes, and as long as you refuse to give them back, I’m not grooming you,” Felicity says. She manages to throw his hand off her ankle but he just whimpers in response, gazing up at her with such a puppy dog expression, her heart instantly melts. “Stop looking at me like that. You know I can’t resist that face.”

“Pleeeeaaase?” Oliver draws out, eyes wide.

“I could get Diggle to come over and do it.”

Immediately, his expression shutters, and Felicity regrets suggesting it. Oliver curls up tighter, turning away from her and fiddling with his hands anxiously. “No, Dig’s not allowed to touch my wings,” he mutters, sounding somewhat unsettled and vexed. “Only you can.”

“And that’s not offensive at all,” Diggle calls from across the room.

A deep, rumbling growl erupts from Oliver’s chest and his eyes flash with anger. His wings quiver, wracked with tension. He only stops this behaviour when, to both her and his shock, Diggle grabs the spray bottle they’ve been using to wet his feathers during preening, and sprays him directly in the face.

“Bad Oliver,” Diggle says shortly.

Oliver bares his teeth in such a way that Felicity is starkly reminded of a feral animal backed into a corner, and when he shifts threateningly, Diggle sprays him again. Snickering, Felicity has to turn her head away to hide her grin from the vigilante, as he turns to glare at her. For good measure, Diggle sprays him a final time. Oliver falls back onto his behind with a huff, wiping the water off his face frustratedly, mewing angrily to himself.

“You’re a nasty man,” the vigilante mutters under his breath.

“And you’re an overgrown chicken with an attitude problem,” Diggle counters.

Oliver heaves a furious snarl.

Felicity flicks him on the forehead annoyedly and he reels back in astonishment, face scrunching up. “Settle down,” she orders. “John has been here helping you for the last few days, you could at least act grateful. And I’ll have you know, he’s already touched a part of your wings - he’s been helping me sort out all of your molted feathers.”

Oliver looks very unhappy at this, craning his neck to glower up at her, and then he face plants into one of her t-shirts and exhales, going still. Felicity waits with a quirked eyebrow for him to reply with something, wanting to hear him try and stumble through an apology, or stammer a terrible excuse. Instead, the only response she gets is a snore. Oliver has fallen back to sleep, too tired to stay awake any longer. She still got the last word in the argument, so she counts that as a win, but Felicity is a little disappointed that Oliver was only properly awake to speak with her for five minutes or so.

“He pass out again?” Diggle questions, coming up behind her somewhat warily. He's most likely concerned about having the winged vigilante pounce angrily on him for approaching. “I've got to change his IV and have the feeling that he'll hit me if he's conscious.”

“He's out,” she replies with a sigh. “New IV bags on the counter if you need them.”

As Dig sets about switching the IV bag for a fresh one, seamlessly slipping the needle into Oliver’s wrist with practised fingers, he questions, tugging on her hoodie cushioning the vigilante’s head, “Want me to pull this off him for you? I know you get chilly later on at night. We need to get some heaters installed down here.”

“It's fine,” she dismisses. Fishing out her work laptop, she sinks down to the floor with a soft groan as she stretches her back. Felicity leans back against the hard wall, wincing at how bitingly cold it is, sitting cross legged and shuffling over slightly so Oliver’s head is resting by her knee. “I’ll just grab a blanket later if I get cold.”

Diggle nods, gnawing on his lower lip. “So,” he starts, obviously trying to sound casual. “Does Oliver…”

“No,” she answers shortly.

Her partner appears apologetic. “I’m sorry, Felicity.”

“Yeah, I am too,” she sighs.

“Do you wanna talk about it?”

“Not right now.”

“Okay. But if you want to talk about it, I’m here for you, you know that, right?”

Felicity manages a small grin. “I do. Thank you, Dig.”

He nods, smiling back at her. “I think you’ve got it from here. I might head out,” he informs her. He’s appraising her closeness to the vigilante with a raised eyebrow, but Felicity doesn’t let it phase her. Dig raised an eyebrow the other day when she checked his temperature with a thermometer in Oliver’s ear. “Don’t hesitate to call me if you need anything, alright?”

“Will do,” Felicity answers. “I’m working from home for the rest of the week, so I’ll rarely be leaving the Foundry - if you could sometimes bring me a salad or Chinese over in the evenings, that would be lovely.”

Diggle nods, gathering his belongings as he prepares to make his exit. Every few seconds, he casts a narrowed eyed glance over towards the sleeping vigilante, as if expecting him to leap up suddenly and tap dance. “Just remember,” he reminds her teasingly, “I have access to the CCTV.”

A deep flush decorates the blonde’s cheeks and sweeps down her neck, and Felicity flicks a loose lock of her hair behind her hair whilst ducking her head, embarrassed as she splutters, “Dig!” indignantly. She knows he means it in jest, but being reminded of how the bodyguard caught her and the vigilante’s extremely heat-of-the-moment kiss causes her to blush.

Diggle just grins, waves and takes his leave. As soon as the sounds of Diggle’s boots clunking loudly on the staircase, and the sharp thunk and click of the security door fade, echoes dying out, Felicity throws caution to the wind. She scoots even closer to Oliver, gently lifting his head up so she can slip underneath him. His head lies in her lap, eyelids fluttering weakly and a small mewl escaping his mouth as the movement jostles him. She holds her breath until he succumbs back to sleep.

“There we go,” she murmurs. “You can keep my hoodie, Oliver. I didn’t mean it earlier when I threatened not to groom your wings if you didn’t give it back.” Tenderly raking her fingers through the secondaries on the nearest, bunched up wing, she smiles when he shudders with a relieved sigh, curling up closer to her. “Such a sweetheart.”

She manages to groom the entire thirty feet of feathers within a few hours. It helps that a large expanse of the wings are covered in pinfeathers, most of the feathers having molted already. Dabbing her fingers into the oil-water mixture, she cleans and massages the newly erupted tips of feathers, poking through the pins, hoping that it will help with the blood flow and the development of the barbs.

Frowning, she wonders aloud, “Birds usually have oil glands to produce oil themselves for preening. Do you have those?”

Pausing, Felicity fans her hands out, curiously brushing her fingers over the bones, joints and lower undersides of Oliver’s wings. She’s too curious for her own good. As she reaches the base of the wings, near the small of his back, her fingers glide over the fluffy downy feathers until come across a small, hard, knot-like bump.

Intrigued, she prods it lightly - and startles when in response, Oliver’s wings shake, his back arches and he moans, hands tightening around her hoodie. It’s obviously a highly sensitive area. Felicity watches the vigilante closely, fascinated by his reaction as she gently touches the bump again and he whines, stretching and trembling, although remaining unconscious. She makes a quiet, shocked noise when a few drops of a colourless, waxy substance coats her fingers, coming from the bump.

“Huh!” she exclaims, rubbing the oil between her fingers.

It’s an uropygial gland. Felicity remembers reading about them when doing her wing and molting research. The glands are usually found on the rump of a bird, and the bird uses the oil it releases to preen its feathers. Considering that the preening oil is waterproof and helps maintain the integrity of the feathers, Felicity has to speculate on why Oliver has never mentioned this before. Surely using his own preening oil, strange and baffling though it is that he produces it, would be much better than using the bio-oil and water mixture to preen his feathers? It would mean a lot of massaging and manipulating of the gland, but Felicity doesn’t mind doing that, even if is unusual.

“Let’s have a go at this, shall we?” Felicity mutters. Might as well get her hands dirty.

She only realises _why_ exactly Oliver neglected to allude to his own preening glands when she begins using the preening oil, the clear waxy liquid slicking her fingers, to treat the pinfeathers. Upon her third stroking of the gland to prompt it to realise more oil, she notices a very noticeable tent in the front of Oliver’s pants, and ultimately registers precisely the reason why he’s grinding down into the floor.

The uropygial gland is an erogenous zone on the winged vigilante’s body. And Felicity’s just been fondling it for the last five minutes, having absolutely no clue what kind of stimulation she’s been giving the archer.

Holy shit. She didn’t think things between them could ever get more awkward after the kiss. Guess she was wrong.

Swallowing and now feeling nauseous as she draws her shaking fingers away from Oliver’s wings, and away from the gland, she desperately wipes her hands down on a blanket in the nest. She doesn’t feel sick _because_ of the oil, or the fact that she was preening his feathers - she’s sick because she’s essentially just wing-jacked Oliver off and given him an erection, without realising it, or intending to; she felt Oliver up and touched him in an intimate, sexual manner, violating so many boundaries.

And he won’t even remember any of it.

“Shit, shit, shit,” she whispers, tears pricking her eyes. She forces herself to crawl away from him, standing on numb, wobbly legs and stumbling over to her desk of monitors. Gasping, she braces herself against the desk. “Oh god, Oliver, I’m so sorry. I just - I didn’t know, and - I’m _so sorry_.”

He may be asleep and can’t hear her, and he may never remember this, but that somehow just makes it worse for her.

Is this karma? He kissed her, and now she’s given him a boner.

Whatever is it: karma, the cruel fates, or just sheer bad luck, she hates it. She’ll never forget this. She'll never forgive herself.

Felicity doesn’t go within ten feet of Oliver for the rest of the evening. She stresses, she eats ice cream they have in the mini freezer, and she keeps an eye on him from afar. The only time the blonde does go near him, and does touch him, with skittish, shaking hands, is to re-fit the IV and check the needle marks which now litter his wrists for infection.

She sleeps on it. She drags her mattress and blankets to the other side of the Foundry and lies on her side, drifting off into a restless slumber with her eyes fixed on the winged vigilante’s slumped, curled up form. Ultimately, just as she’s succeeded in sinking into that hazy, floating state that accompanies the early stages of sleep, Felicity comes to a realisation.

She can’t blame herself. She didn’t know. Oliver was unconscious, so couldn’t alert her to it, and he’s never mentioned his uropygial glands before. They are _both_ victims in this situation. Felicity has to forgive herself. It’s disturbing and alarming to realise, but this is exactly what she needed to help process the events that occurred over the last few days. She needed a shock to force her to recognise that she can’t shy away from Oliver. He needs her, _will still_ need her over the next coming days, and she has to be able to help him without being afraid or hesitant to touch him.

She falls asleep to that, and then when she wakes up the next morning, it’s because of a cell phone’s shrill, insistent ringing. Felicity staggers off the mattress, groaning at her aching back and muscles, heading towards where the incessant noise is coming from. She’s wiping the sleeping dust from her groggy eyes when her hand finds the phone, and without even glancing down to check that it’s hers, she picks up.

Her voice is cracked from tiredness when she answers, “Hello?”

There’s a beat of silence, and then a gruff, angry-sounding voice demanding, “Who is this?”

Frowning, Felicity lowers the phone to check the caller ID - and almost drops the phone in her alarm. It’s not her cell phone. It’s the Hood phone. The one Oliver and Diggle told her was paired with Detective Lance’s, of the SCPD. This must be the detective, although why he’s calling at… yes, it’s 6 am, Felicity has no idea.

“I am the Hood’s, uh, associate,” Felicity manages, although she sounds hesitant, even to her own ears. Luckily, her voice is disguised by the voice modulator installed. Hopefully, her nervousness is drowned out by the dull, buzz of the machine to the other end of the line.

“No, you’re not,” the detective responds, annoyed. “Your voice isn’t low enough to be his associate. I’ve spoken with that guy before. Now who are you, and where’s angelboy?”

Felicity is about to answer that she’s another associate that he hasn’t met before, and that the Hood is occupied, but as soon as the detective utters that ridiculous, adorable nickname, she bursts out laughing, wheezing, “Oh my god, you call him _angelboy_?”

“Well, if you’re working with him, you know why.” Lance’s voice sounds defensive and ever so slightly embarrassed. “So what are you? I’m guessing you’re female judging by the pitch your voice.”

Taking a seat in front of the monitor set up, Felicity props her feet up onto the counter, wiggling her fluffy sock wrapped toes. “I am… not confirming, nor denying that. I guess I’m sort of his partner.”

There’s a pause, and then Lance questions incredulously, “You’re his _WIFE_?”

“NO!” Felicity’s feet thud to the ground as she splutters, “God, no, I’m not his wife. Not partner in that sense at _all_. Nope. Partner as in - as in _work_ partner.”

“You’re his girlfriend,” Lance decides. Felicity chokes, just about to stammer a response, but the detective cuts her off, asking abruptly, “Where is he? I’ve gotta case file I need him to take a look at.”

“I thought you were trying to _arrest_ the Hood,” Felicity answers, confused. “Now you’re asking him for help?”

“It’s on the down-low, alright?” the detective grumbles in reply. “I’d get arrested myself if the rest of the SCPD knew I was doing this, but I ain’t got another choice here.”

“Oooh, I get it.” She can’t help but grin, examining her fluffy socks. “You’re his inside guy in the SCPD. I’m guessing you occasionally swipe or destroy evidence when it’s collected, guide the officers in the wrong direction when they’re too close to him.”

“Yeah, incriminate me over the phone, why don’t you?” Lance mutters. “Look, where is he? Put him on, I need to speak to him.”

“He’s, um, currently preoccupied,” Felicity says delicately. “But I can write down the message for him for a later time, if you want.”

“What, you his secretary now?”

Felicity probably would find that insulting, if she didn’t come up with a perfect response in a split second, joking back, “Actually, I’m his carer.”

That gains a chuckle from the detective and a muttered, “Yeah, he’d need one. Those social skills of ‘is are rusty and his emotions are whacked to hell. Look, okay, you just tell him this case involves one of those dirtbag one-percenters your boy loves to shoot his arrows into. The guy’s managing to squirm out of the charges, and SCPD can’t do anything about it, because he’s paying off all the right people off. I need featherhead to pin him down, find some evidence using those illegal, vigilante methods of his, and get a confession from ‘im. A confession under duress is better than no confession at all.”

Felicity glances back towards where Oliver is still conked out in a mess of feathers and blankets, grimacing. “When do you need this stuff done by?”

“Why? S’there gonna be a problem?”

“There… might be. He’s… very busy at the moment. Very engrossed in his… arrow-ing. Lots and lots of… Hood stuff, keeping him tied up.”

“Aw shit, he’s injured, isn’t he?” Lance groans. “What’s he up and done this time?”

“I never said he was injured,” Felicity protested quickly.

“You didn’t have to. Only other time angelboy’s not been able to get in with a case was after dealing with a trigger-happy Triad enforcer down at the docks. Kept on insisting down the line that he was fine, but his associate had to take over because he kept on coughing up river water after being shoved in.”

Felicity sighs. This detective knows what he’s talking about. That sounds exactly like Oliver. “Yeah, he’s currently indisposed,” she admits. “It could be a few more days until he’s back on his feet. This isn’t… a normal type of injury. I’ll make sure he gets your message. Is there a timescale for this case?”

“The guy’s gonna get out of custody, but he’ll be under surveillance for the next two weeks or so. Your boy’s got a fortnight to get his feathers straightened out, leathers on, and get back out flyin’ the streets to take this guy down.” The sounds of muffled voices in the background cause Felicity to shift nervously, about to suggest they wrap up this conversation, but Lance gets there first. “I’ll call’n check in next week. You look after that boyfriend of yours, get featherhead back out in the action. God forbid my captain hear me say this, but for a vigilante, he’s doin’ a half decent job at helping reduce crime in this city.”

“He’s not my -” Lance hangs up, and Felicity finishes rather pitifully, “- boyfriend. Nice to meet and speak with you too.” Dropping the cell phone onto the counter with a clutter, the blonde swivels her chair around so she faces the feathery lump in the corner, which is her winged vigilante. Except, there is no longer a feathery lump there. She startles, hands gripping the armrests of the chair as she calls out, alarmed, “Oliver? _OLIVER!?_ ”

“Shh!”

Yelping, Felicity leaps out of her seat and whips around, trying to reach for the nearest weapon - which is a red pen left over from her note taking. She points it towards the origin of the voice, but then sighs in relief when she sees that it’s just Oliver. The vigilante is standing slightly crouched, his wings flared and eyes wild as he glances around the Foundry. He looks like some sort of startled panther, eyes darting about and muscles tensing. He also looks extremely flushed, a thin sheen of sweat covering his skin. Felicity narrows her gaze, observing him carefully, swallowing as a pit of worry forms like a boulder sitting in her stomach. His new feathers, which are still stubbornly black as they come through, glint under the harsh lights, but there is something distinctly _off_ about them; she’ll have to examine them closely in a minute, because there is definitely something wrong, but she can’t put her finger on it at the moment.

“Oliver?” Felicity questions warily. His gaze snaps towards her, and his stunningly blue eyes widen, focusing in on her like lasers. She feels as if she’s pinned under a big cat’s predatory stare. “You okay there?”

She didn’t hear him wake up, but he obviously regained consciousness sometime during her conversation with Lance. The fact that he’s stealthy enough to skulk around the Foundry even when ill and half delirious should surprise her, but she knows him too well by now. Oliver can move like a shadow - he probably could even if both his legs were broken.

“Shh,” Oliver orders once again. “We have to be quiet.” He moves towards her, grabbing her wrist and tugging. His fever must be getting the better of him, because his movements are slow and sluggish, and his voice is slurred. “We can’t let them find us, Felicity.”

Releasing a confused, winded sound as she’s shoved into the vigilante’s corner nest, the blonde has to scramble back to avoid being squished by a half naked Oliver as he falls into it next to her, curling up but with his knees bent beneath him. He looks as if he’s ready to jump up at a second’s notice, low rumble escaping his throat, starkly similar to that of a wolf’s.

“Um - let who find us?”

He turns to her, and his expression is completely serious as the winged vigilante answers, “The dolphins, Felicity. The _dolphins_.”

She would laugh if she wasn’t so bewildered. “The dolphins?”

“Yes,” he nods frantically. “We must hide. From the dolphins.”

“Oliver, you are aware that we’re on land.”

“Yeeesss.”

“And dolphins - they can’t stay on land. They’re water mammals.”

“That’s what they want you to think,” Oliver hisses, and at this, Felicity starts laughing. “No, stop laughing! Shh!”

She schools her expression, nodding seriously. “Right. We have to be quiet.”

“Yes,” he agrees. “So the dolphins can’t find us.”

They sit in complete silence for a minute or so. Oliver shifts halfway through that time so he settles in front of her, blocking the rest of the Foundry out by spreading his wings. This also causes most of the light to be blocked out so that they’re seated in his nest in semi-darkness. His cerulean eyes, however, continue to gleam, blinking at her. They’re beautiful eyes. How Felicity didn’t realise how stunning they are before, she doesn’t know.

She hesitates, before questioning, “So, are the dolphins gone?”

“Shh!” Oliver insists.

“Are they still here?”

“I don’t know.” Oliver looks stricken. Felicity has to clap a hand over her mouth to stop herself from bursting out laughing. He looks adorable. He turns his head around, using one of his hand to push down his wing and feathers, scanning the room. “I can’t hear the dolphins anymore.”

“You could hear them earlier?”

He nods.

“What do the dolphins sound like?”

He narrows his eyes at her, lifting a single hand to wipe away the sweat from his forehead, which is dripping down into his eyes. The vigilante’s body temperature must be rising. She’ll have to get him to snap out of this strangely erratic, fever-induced behaviour soon, just so she can cool him down with an ice pack.

“They make scary noises,” Oliver whispers. “Are you sure you won’t be frightened?”

“Oh, I think I can take it,” Felicity says.

“Are you _sure_?”

“I’m sure,” she chuckles.

Oliver nods again, pausing very briefly before he announces, “Prepare yourself.” He inhales deeply and then - he meows like a cat.

Felicity explodes into a fit of giggles, unable to contain herself any longer. Oliver flinches at her sudden laughter, eyes going as round as dinner plates as he flails desperately, whacking her on the arm as he continues to loudly shush her.

“Felicity, you’re going to attract the dolphins right to us!” he cries out.

She can barely breathe she’s laughing so hard, managing to choke out, “Oliver, I think we’re safe from the dolphins.”

His frantic expression turns curious. “Why’d you think?”

Felicity wipes the tears from her eyes, forcing herself to adopt a very serious, reassuring expression. “The dolphins and I are friends, and we came to an agreement that they won’t hurt us.”

The winged vigilante looks confused. “Really?”

“Yeah.”

“But the dolphins told me they want they want to hurt me,” Oliver says, his voice small.

“When did they tell you that?”

He shrugs, glancing down at his hands. His breathing is slowly becoming more and more laboured due to his fever and obvious exhaustion. Sighing, Felicity gently presses on his shoulder to urge him to lie down on his side, and Oliver grabs one of the pillows and cushions it to his chest, frowning to himself as his wings quiver.

“Want me to groom your wings?” Felicity asked softly.

He nods, hiding his face in the pillow with a humph. “S’long as the dolphins leave us alone,” he mutters.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading :) Please leave kudos and comment!
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13, @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter 6 is here! Oh man, all of you left such wonderful comments on the last chapter, thank you so much. I really appreciate all your support.
> 
> The amazing Becky, @nvwhovian, is back on beta duty, so thank you, Crumpet, once again ;)
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

* * *

Pretty soon after that, Oliver passes out from exhaustion and fever again. While Felicity is amused and also confused by the vigilante’s insistence about the dolphins, she’s consumed by immense concern as well. She knows from high school biology that high fever can cause incoherence and delirium, but also brain and organ damage. Hopefully, his week-long illness won’t cause any harm to him in the long run; Oliver is still healing from being shot and having his air sac ruptured.

The blonde manages to preen the undersides of the vigilante’s wings by the time that midday arrives. The reason the wings appeared to look wrong before was due to dried blood on the erupting feathers. It does concern Felicity slightly - her research on molting doesn’t say anything about bloody pinfeathers, but she doesn’t know what Oliver’s norm is, so she has nothing to compare against. As the clock hits noon, Felicity pulls away from the feathers, wiping the sweat off her forehead using the back of her hand.

She grimaces, rising on wobbly, tingling legs to grab a towel; the oil mixture she’s been using to gently massage Oliver’s pin feathers and encourage the last several feathers to drop is covering both of her hands, and since it’s warm and slick, it’s rather disgusting. After cleaning off her hands and choking down one of Oliver’s protein bars for lunch, Felicity settles at her computer set up and forces herself to get some work done, although she occasionally takes breaks to check that Oliver’s alright, making new cold compresses for him and changing the IV bag.

Evening arrives, and with it Diggle, who comes bearing gifts of freshly made Caesar salads. Moaning in pleasure as she wolfs it down, Felicity doesn’t care that she sounds as if she’s having an orgasm - this salad would beat an orgasm any day. She fills Diggle in on the events he’s missed, informing him of Detective Lance’s phone call and request for the Vigilante to assist on a case. Diggle doesn’t seem very surprised, so evidently this has happened before. He reassures her that he’ll handle it, although he does snicker a little when she dismays about being mistaken by the detective as the Vigilante’s wife, then girlfriend.

When Felicity tells the bodyguard about the dolphin incident with Oliver, at first Diggle tries to maintain a blank expression, but as soon as Felicity mentions the fierce vigilante meowing, thinking that’s the sound a dolphin makes, he bursts out laughing. It sets a good mood, and the two of them discuss other funny things that Oliver has done in the past without realising it, such as thinking the milk they sell in stores is from humans, and eggs are chicken’s poop.

As Felicity rises to quickly go and change Oliver’s cold compress and IV bag again, she finds the winged vigilante curled up tightly and shivering. It’s a pitiful sight that almost brings her to tears, so she drags out one of the blankets from the nest floor, beating the dust out of it against the wall before draping it lightly over him.

Oliver immediately snuffles in his sleep and curls a hand over it, pulling it tighter around himself. His half-flared wings, which are now completely bare of his old feathers and covered in feeble pinfeather stubs, retract so that the blanket covers those two trembling limbs as well. He’s not actually cold, Felicity knows, as she checks his temperature to find he’s still stuck with a fever, although it’s much lower than this morning. But even if he’s not cold and his shivering is just caused by his body’s homeostasis being fucked up, that doesn’t mean he should have to suffer, continuing to shiver throughout the night. He looks awful, his skin pale and clammy apart from the red, irritated areas on his wrists where they’ve been inserting the IV needles. Overall, it’s a rather sad look for the usually ferocious, strong angel of the night.

Diggle scrutinises her carefully as the blonde wrings out another cold compress into the sink so she can return to Oliver and gently clean his face, chest and hair of sweat and spilt preening oil. “You like him, don’t you?” he asks quietly.

Felicity glances up, slightly bemused. “Um, yeah? I mean, sure, he can be grumpy and broody sometimes - okay, _most_ of the time - but he’s a good guy. His heart’s in the right place, even if his methods are a little unorthodox sometimes. I mean, the fact that Detective Lance is starting to trust him with secretly assisting on cases is - and that’s not what you meant, is it?”

Diggle smiles at her, but it seems sympathetic, which puts her on edge. “I think you know what I meant, Felicity. At this point, your fondness of him has surpassed the platonic stage.”

She shakes her head. “You can’t know that.”

“I think it’s pretty damn obvious by the way you look at him and care for him. You’re both good looking people, and as I said before, there’s always been some degree of sexual tension. And after everything that’s happened over the last week or so… hell, I’d be shocked if you _didn’t_ harbour some feelings for him.”

Felicity’s about to vehemently protest, her cheeks blushing crimson with embarrassment, but then she sees Diggle’s raised eyebrow aimed at her, and she deflates. “There’s no point in trying to to deny it, is there?” she murmurs, thinking aloud. She straightens up from kneeling next to Oliver, dusting off her hands. Gazing down at the vigilante with a soft expression, she continues, “How could I _not_ care about him, Dig? He’s one of the most genuine human beings I’ve ever met - and he’s not even completely human.”

Diggle runs a hand over his head and face with a sigh before leaning forwards, saying seriously, “Look, Felicity, both you and Oliver are my friends. I have absolutely no issues with this sexual tension brewing between you two, apart from the fact that it often results in me feeling like the awkward third wheel. Especially when you have those long, heart eyes staring competition with each other. What I _will_ have issues with, however, is if either of you hurt each other’s feelings.”

“Dig, I won’t hurt him,” Felicity replies firmly. “Or, at least, I’ll do my very best not to hurt him. And I know he’ll try not to hurt me.”

“Do you want a relationship with him?” Diggle asks, his voice low.

The question stuns her for a brief moment, and Felicity quickly loses herself in thought. She would be lying if she said she hasn’t thought about being in a relationship with the winged vigilante before. In her most secret, darkest dreams, she’s imagined Oliver and her together in more ways than one. Oliver’s a handsome man, and Felicity’s a woman who would definitely call herself somewhat sexually frustrated. It’s only natural that she has fantasies about her attractive co-worker, especially due to how kind and soft he is with her, always touching her shoulders and lower back.

Except Oliver isn’t available. Sure, he’s single, but he’s unquestionably unobtainable concerning romantic relations. He has so much going on within his fragmented mind, with his investigation and search for the family of this Sara girl, who’d also been winged and at the facility with him. That’s not even starting on the mental health and trust issues that Oliver undoubtedly has, which would most likely make a committed relationship incredibly difficult. Does Oliver even know what dating is? Does he even understand human relationships? He was raised in a lab; he might have never received any sort of relationship or sex education.

“Felicity -”

Her head snaps up to Diggle, his calling of her name snapping her out of her thoughts. “Sorry, I don’t - to be honest, I don’t really know. Even if I wanted to or not, it wouldn’t matter - I have the feeling that Oliver is permanently unavailable romantically.”

“I don’t think that’s true.”

She frowns. “How come?”

Diggle gazes at her steadily for a moment, eyes roaming over her face as he gauges her facial expressions. His own morphs into one of amazement and befuddlement. “You really don’t notice it, do you? The way he looks at you. Felicity, that boy stares at you like a blind man seeing the sun for the first time. Sounds terribly cliche, I know, but he… he _glows_ when he’s around you.” When Felicity ducked her head whilst shaking it, abashed, Diggle demanded, “How often do you think Oliver smiles?”

“Everyday,” she answers. “He smiles all the time.”

“Felicity, I swear to god, I never saw Oliver smile before he met you.”

She immediately protests, “That can’t be true.”

“He has anxiety and depression,” Diggle says, his voice and gaze intense. “He was neglected and abused and beaten as a child and he grew up as a science experiment. He’s emotionally stunted and it’s a miracle he even has social cues and the comprehension of an adult. Because in actuality, due to his upbringing, he should have the mental capacity of a child. A very reclusive, deprived child. And considering all the loss and torture he’s experienced, how he’s not suicidal is a mystery.” He shakes his head. “Oliver has absolutely nothing to smile about, Felicity. And yet I’ve never seen him as happy as he is when he’s with you.”

She has no idea how to respond to that. Felicity swallows, her heart in her throat and her stomach feeling as if it’s performing flips. Her eyes wander over to settle onto the sleeping vigilante in the corner of the Foundry and she finds it difficult to inhale for a moment, breath caught in her trachea. To think that Oliver cares about her - and is _happy_ because of her - is causing waves of emotion to wash over her. Pain. Confusion. Embarrassment. But the strongest feeling is one of immense fulfilment, a type of strange satisfaction at Diggle’s words, knowing that it’s her and only her who can stimulate happiness and joy in the winged vigilante.

“A relationship with Oliver would be incredibly tough, Felicity, I hope you know that.”

“I know, Dig.”

“Not to mention the mental toll it would take on you, having to sit back and watch your boyfriend fly out into danger every night, get shot at, almost die -”

“John,” Felicity interrupted softly.

“I just want you to know what you’re getting into.” Diggle pauses. “If you ever get into it.”

“Which I think is highly unlikely,” Felicity concludes.

“Never say never,” the bodyguard finishes off the conversation, before rising to refill his water bottle, leaving the blonde alone with her troubling thoughts.

The last few days of the molt period pass by in a haze of blood, sweat and tears for Felicity, Diggle and Oliver. The winged vigilante remains unconscious throughout it, curled up in his nest sleeping. He appears motionless, as if gripped by the throes of death, apart from the stressful nights where he thrashes and screams due to horrific night terrors, all six limbs flailing and waving around wildly. His exaggerated, feral movements during these nightmares cause major problems - some of Oliver’s developing pinfeathers become damaged. Some of them they’re able to save, some of them they’re forced to pull out with pliers. Felicity never does the deed of the extracting from the wing herself, mostly because she always cries too much for her hands to stay steady; instead, Diggle pulls the pinfeathers whilst the blonde sits with Oliver’s head in her lap, trying to keep his arms pinned down as the delirious, unconscious vigilante shrieks and wails in pain as the broken pinfeathers are yanked out.

The rest of the feathers, which remain healthy and continue to grow, are nurtured tenderly by Felicity. The feathers erupt from the pins pitch black with a strange sheen on their tips that has yet to develop, needing oxygen from the air for the colour to deepen; Felicity cherishes every feather that forms intact and strong, and she tends to the furled and weakened ones with the preening oil mixture until they harden and straighten. It’s exhausting but rewarding work. Every night when she falls asleep by Oliver’s side, at least one of her hands makes contact with his body to reassure herself that he’s there and safe. Felicity is finally able to relax knowing that she has successfully groomed the vigilante’s entire wingspan. Hopefully, her efforts will help his new plumage develop properly.

Meanwhile, as Felicity deals with Oliver’s emotional side and his wings, Diggle looks after Oliver’s physiological health and Vigilante business. The last few days of molt are arduous and dangerous, with the vigilante’s fever spiking lethally high at 106 degrees at one point. Diggle, however, maintains his calm and collected persona, easily taking charge of the situation. He somehow rapidly finds dozens of ice bags at the most random of times, stripping Oliver of all his clothes with no abandon so he can cover the winged vigilante with ice on all sides. Felicity knows she wouldn’t be able to cope without Diggle’s amazing level-headedness. He keeps her grounded, and he keeps Oliver alive. He also handles the case with Lance, keeping in contact with the detective and providing him with intel Felicity is able to gather digitally (and illegally) relevant to the case.

The end of the molt period finally arrives on Day 20, and thank god it finishes then, because Felicity and Diggle are both worn to the bone. Felicity didn't know it was possible for her to be sick of somebody's guts, but after over two weeks stuck in the same cramped, dark basement with both the winged vigilante and Diggle, she's pretty certain she would be happy to not see them again for a full week.

Oliver's fever breaks early in the morning, his vitals and overall health massively improving within three hours. It's a miraculously quick recovery seeing as at 5am he'd been practically comatose with illness, and now at 8am he seems to be simply sleeping. Diggle leaves the IV in mostly for hydration's sake, but for the first time since the molt began, he can put away the defibrillator, which has sat ominously on the counter nearby for the past 20 days. Oliver is safe. He's in no danger of dying from his body failing under the stress of the molt anymore.

Felicity grooms and preens the archer's wings for one last time whilst he still slumbers. All of the new feathers have come out pristine and perfect; there is a dull sheen coating them that's refusing to come off even with the blonde's firm wipe downs of preening oil, so she's unsure whether or not the midnight colour of the feathers is actually indicating new coloured plumage or is just the coating. The tips of his primaries, secondaries and tertiaries, all the feathers along the leading edges of his wings, all have the same thick, oily coating, although these are all metal grey. Felicity is dismayed that all of the white in Oliver's wings has vanished - the gradient of white to black seems to have faded, which is a shame, because he looked very handsome and smart with that plumage before.

As Diggle and Felicity pack away the rest of the emergency equipment around lunchtime, Oliver groans his way into consciousness. Felicity immediately drops the box of IV bags she's holding and rushes over, heart thudding in her chest almost painfully. Will Oliver be lucid? Will he remember what's happened? Will he be in his right mind, or will he think that she's the enemy and attack?

He's struggling to sit up in his nest, wings dragging behind him as she reaches him. Oliver's head snaps up and he stares at her with an intense gaze and unreadable expression, looking haggard and exhausted. She holds her breath, maintaining a good distance of five feet in case he suddenly lunges at her, but Felicity exhales in relief when the archer mutters in a fractured, tired voice, "Felicity?"

"Yeah," she responds, smile breaking out onto her face. Kneeling down, she helps him sit up properly so he's not straining any muscles, helping maneuver his limp, heavy wings into more comfortable positions. "Welcome back, mister. How are you feeling? You weren't kidding when you said molt was a tough ride."

"S'not over yet," he murmurs, to her confusion. "It's the last stretch of five days that's the worst."

"Umm... Oliver, it is over," Felicity replies, frowning.

He narrows his eyes at her, huffing. "No, it can't be. It's only Day Thirteen."

Felicity's stomach plummets, and she feels physically sick as she corrects him softly, "Oliver, it's Day Twenty."

He blinks at her. After a moment, he denies shakily, "No, it can't be." He turns to Diggle and demands, "What day is it?"

As much as his questioning Diggle reassures Felicity that he's back to normal state of mind, with his aversion to their partner gone, she is ever so slightly offended that he doesn't take her word as truth. 

Diggle just responds with a shrug, "Felicity's right. It's Day Twenty."

Oliver's face falls and he turns away from them both, appearing aghast and upset. Felicity has to physically restrain herself from throwing her arms around him to comfort him. "I really lost seven days? But if we're on Day Twenty then that means -"

He surges to his feel desperately, nails scratching at the walls for purchase due to his unsteadiness. When he stumbles, Felicity rushes forwards to catch him. With her supporting him, they reach the center of the Foundry. As soon as the stronger beams of light from the high intensity lamps fall onto him, Oliver flares out his stiff, aching wings with a whine. He manages to get his right wing completely spread, but his left wing, which is the tiniest bit weaker, needs Felicity to gently grasp the humerus and open it up.

The vigilante rakes his eyes over his wings, dazed. He keeps his expression carefully blank as he inspects his new feathers, swallowing every so often. After a few minutes of examining the undersides, he tilts the wings forwards so he can glance down at the oversides. Felicity feels incredibly nervous. He trusted her with preening and grooming his wings, and she thinks she did well, but it's Oliver's judgement of how she did that's important. Hopefully he won't strike her down with a trio of arrows if she unknowingly messed it up, or did a shit job of layering the feathers.

His voice is coarse as Oliver asks, "Felicity, you... You preened my wings?"

She nods.

His intensely blue eyes flash over to her. "By yourself?"

"Yeah," she answers. "You wouldn't let Dig touch them so, um, I groomed them myself."

Slowly, Oliver nods and switches his gaze back to his wings. "Every day?"

"Yep. Morning and night."

"With the oil mixture?"

"Yes," she replies, blushing as the memory of her trying to milk his preening glands for his own natural oil fleets through her thoughts. Thank god he can't read minds.

"And you - you took out all the broken pin feathers?"

"I hope that's okay. Dig and I looked it up online and that's what it said to do if a parrot's pin feathers broke during a molt. You're not a parrot, though, obviously, so we weren't sure if -"

"No, it's - that's what you're meant to do," he cuts in, licking his lips. He finally, finally looks away from his wings, eyes fixating onto the blonde with laser-like vigour. "Felicity."

She gnaws on her lip anxiously. "Yes?"

"Marry me," he says seriously.

She chokes on air whilst Diggle does a double take beside her. Felicity knows her eyes must be round as plates as she squeaks, "Excuse me!?” incredulously. After a second where Oliver's expression doesn't change, she has to pinch herself to make sure she's not dreaming - because this sure as hell would be the kind of dream Felicity's sexually frustrated mind would conjure up.

"My wings have never been in this good condition coming out of a molt," Oliver says, and Felicity relaxes. He'd been joking about the marriage thing. She doesn't know why she immediately thought he was being serious. She's pretty certain that he doesn't like her that way - she doesn't even know if he's straight. It would be just her luck to have a massive crush towards a winged vigilante that happens to be demi- or asexual. "I think the fact that I can actually stand and walk, when usually after a molt I can barely even breathe on my own, attests to say that you're by far the best molt companion I've ever had, Felicity." He averts his eyes, adding softly, "And considering my last molt companion was Sara, and she knew me like she knew herself, that's a bold statement."

She's rather speechless, although when Diggle jokes, "Run now, Oliver's never going to let you leave otherwise," she snorts and swats his arm. “Although, you know, man, leading with the marriage thing was a bit of a shocker there.”

“Aren't you meant to ask somebody to marry you if you want to show extreme appreciation of their existence, and the impact of their existence on your own?” Oliver asks, frowning.

A harsh noise that sounds like something a dying cat would make tears from Felicity’s throat, and she feels as if she can barely breathe.

“Yeah, okay, we seriously need to get you some books on human customs, modern phrases and social cues,” Diggle mutters.

The blonde finally finds her voice to speak, having been lost in her own thoughts about the major significance of her being better at preening wings that somebody actually with wings, who’d grown up with Oliver - and passively been in past relations with him. "I really appreciate that compliment, Oliver," Felicity eventually says, honesty clear in her tone. "But I just did what anybody else would have done."

"I think you went above and beyond," Diggle counters. He carries over a strawberry protein shake for Oliver, who grimaces, but downs it knowing he needs the calories. They'll have to keep him on a liquid only diet for the next week and slowly introduce him back to solids. "You spent nearly five hours a day wiping down his new feathers with oil, Felicity. I wouldn't have had the patience to do that. You even did it with the pin feathers."

She's blushing so much she's afraid she'll look like a tomato, so Felicity quickly changes the subject, saying, "I didn't know how to get the sheaths off the new feathers, Oliver. They wouldn't come off using the oil mixture."

"Oh, don't worry about that," the vigilante reassures her, gingerly tucking his wings back into his spine. "It's just a protective coating. It'll wear off when I shower and use my own natural preening oil."

"And then we'll get a look at your breeding plumage?" Diggle quirks a teasing eyebrow.

Oliver flushes scarlet, muttering under his breath about his immature partners before wobbling away to the shower room, grabbing a towel and fresh clothes as he walks. Felicity watches him go with held in giggles, only releasing them once he vanishes behind the door, slamming it shut as if he's sulking about being teased.

"Notice how he didn't deny it," Diggle comments to her, winking. "Because he knows he's shit at lying to us."

"Wait, you're serious?" she laughs. "It's actually breeding plumage?"

"He told me that he molts in breeding plumage when it comes up to the end of winter. It's February," he points out. "It's breeding plumage. And you know what breeding plumage is like, Felicity?" He grins widely. "Flashy."

It takes Oliver forty minutes or so to re-emerge from the shower room. Felicity and Diggle are both enjoying sandwiches that Diggle brought with him last night and stored in the fridge when he shuffles back out, wings drawn in tightly to his back. He's dressed in fresh cargo pants and a dark blue t-shirt; although he looks clean, awake and alert from standing under the water, he also appears more worn out; his face is flushed and his strides are lagging slightly. Felicity very pointedly tries to think about anything else except reasons why Oliver might be tired that are a result of milking preening glands for natural oil. She fails, of course, and ends up coughing and refusing to look at him until she gets her mind out of the gutter. She shouldn't even know about the reactions the preening glands can cause, so she certainly shouldn't be reacting to his behavior.

"Did you mix pixie dust or something into the oil mixture you used for preening my feathers, Felicity?" Oliver questions, sounding bemused.

"Erm... no," she responds. "Why?"

"Because I'm absolutely certain that this has never happened before - to me or to any of the other people who ended up like me from the facility."

He fans his wings out to full span, giving a little flap to spread them out further. Felicity's exhales, air rushing out of her lungs in shock and leaving her breathless in awe. Now the dull oil sheen has been washed away, Oliver's new plumage can be seen properly in all its glory, and it's magnificent.

His wings appear a deep, midnight black, the feathers iridescent and glinting with a dark green hue in the sharp lights; within the dark plumage there are speckles and sparks of silver, dotted throughout his entire wingspan. They twinkle like tiny stars within the night's sky, and it's beautiful. What's absolutely incredible, however, and makes Felicity gasp in amazement, is the reflective, shiny silver tips of all the leading edge feathers, gleaming like razor sharp titanium. If Felicity hadn't preened the feathers earlier and knew that they are made of the same fibrous barbs as the other feathers, she would think that they’re made of pure metal. Overall, Oliver's wings are stunning, and she doesn't realise that she's walked towards him, memorised, until she bumps into his body and has a hand curled in the black feathers.

She jumps back, immediately apologising, "Sorry, I didn't mean to -"

But he stops her, interrupting by saying, "No, it's okay. You can touch."

There's a strangely pleased look on his face, as if he's satisfied by her astounded reaction, but Felicity doesn't focus on that - instead she turns to his wings, running her fingers down the feathers, shivering when her fingertips cross the boundary of midnight black that shimmers forest green, to metallic silver on the primaries.

"I've never seen silver on wings before," he murmurs. "You must have a magic touch."

"I'm going to ignore the euphemism because you don't understand what euphemisms are, and instead just say, 'wow'," she replies, thumbing gently at the silver feather tips. Yep, they're actually feathers. Nothing metal or solid about them. How that kind of metallic pigment has been produced and set into his feathers, she has no idea; Oliver doesn't seem to have a clue either.

"Damn, man," Diggle whistles. "That's impressive. Congrats."

"Thank you," Oliver says smugly. "But my wings definitely wouldn't look like this without Felicity being my molt companion, so really she should get all the credit."

"I get to take credit for this?" she whispers. He nods. She cracks a smile. "Damn, I did a great job."

He laughs softly. Felicity’s heart skips a beat when he reaches out to lace her fingers with his, squeezing gently. He raises her hand and presses a soft kiss to her knuckles, smiling as he confirms, "Yeah, you did."

"I don't think you're gonna have any issues attracting a mate with that plumage," Diggle says, smirking.

"I don't need to," Oliver replies, so quietly she almost doesn't hear it, but when Felicity looks up, he's gazing at her with a fond, affectionate look in his eyes that makes her knees go weak.

She has to take a step back and force herself to turn away from the wings before she smacks her face into them from accidentally getting too close in her mesmerised state. "So that's the molt finished then? No pesky after-molt or anything?"

The winged vigilante shakes his head. "Nope, that's it done. I will have to deal with all my fallen feathers though. Which one of you acted as my feather guardian while I was unconscious, then?"

 

Felicity narrows her eyes in bafflement. Did Oliver mention anything about feather guarding before? "Um... I guess we both were? If you mean who collected all your molted feathers, stored and bagged them, then Dig and I both did that."

Stalking over to the counter where the feather operation was running throughout his molt, the vigilante’s wings puff out, flaring experimentally as he walks. He shoots a rather wild glance back towards them both, his eyes are piercing. “ _All_ the feathers?”

“Oliver, we even counted,” Diggle replies in exasperation.

The vigilante responds with a noncommitted hum, ruffling through all the labelled plastic sandwich bags, checking all of the molted, wilting feathers within them. Diggle rolls his eyes and casts a tired, slightly irritated look back towards Felicity. The blonde just shrugs. Obviously this is something that Oliver cares about, and judging by the way he’s biting his lip and his wings are bristling, those sparks of silver woven into the sea of black glistening, he’s anxious about this too. They can’t judge him at all when they have no idea what’s running through his mind - and Oliver’s so introverted that it would be more likely that Felicity dye her hair pink like that one time she did at the beginning of college than he open up to them and explain why he’s so adamant about this feather collection thing.

She remembers briefly the vigilante informing them at the very beginning of his molt some of his reasons for being so resolute about this; _Have to make sure that they don’t get into the wrong hands. Once I’ve shed them all, I’ll burn them_. But it’s not as if the police or government can do DNA checks on feathers… can they?

“They’re all here,” Oliver breathes in relief, snapping Felicity back to the situation at hand. The vigilante rocks back on his heels, tense wings relaxing and slumping against his back. “You - you really collected _all_ of them.”

“Said we did,” Diggle grunted, preparing two cups of coffee over in the other corner. “You can trust us, Oliver.”

“I know,” he nods, reordering the bags once again, so the feathers are layered out in order of primaries to tertiaries, followed by the coverts. “I know I can, but - this is delicate. There are so many feathers -”

“Yeah, over thirty thousand,” Felicity mutters, thinking back to the absolute pain that had been trying to determine how to label random feathers with no distinguishing markings.

“- And it can be so, so stressful trying to collect and label them all,” Oliver finishes. “But you did it. You actually did it.” He shakes his head, appearing amazed and overwhelmed with emotion. “Thank you.”

Passing her one of the coffee cups, Diggle elbows her lightly in the side, teasing, “Oh, a thank you from our fierce winged crusader. We must have done a good job.”

“Considering we spent over fourteen hours that one time trying to sort out all the coverts, I damn well hope we did,” Felicity laughs.

To their utter astonishment, Oliver rushes over and throws his arms around both of them, embracing them. Diggle’s eyes widen and he hugs back, and Felicity feels as if all the oxygen is being sucked out of her lungs when she feels the massive wings spread and wrap around the three of them like a giant, dark cloak. She’s barely able to revel in the warmth radiating from the archer’s form and wings before he’s yanking back from the group hug, looking awkward and uncomfortable. The embrace only lasts two seconds or so, but both she and Diggle are absolutely shocked by it.

Oliver’s never hugged them both before; at least, not in his right mind. Seeing their surprise and bewilderment at his actions, Oliver flushes a deep red, ducking his head. He slinks away in embarrassment, muttering furiously to himself in Russian before either of them can say anything, vanishing into the darkness of the Foundry, his black wings hiding him from sight as he was draped in shadow.

Felicity feels a sense of pride swelling inside of her. She knows that Oliver dislikes social interaction and human contact. She also knows that despite that, Oliver is touch-starved and craves affection, due to receiving none when he was a child at that facility. But she also knows that Oliver doesn’t trust easily, and once you have his trust, it’s even harder to get him to open up to you.

Oliver just opened up to them. He’s growing and evolving emotionally as a person. He feels like he’s comfortable enough around both her and Diggle to start initiating contact between them, and he’s lowering his barriers to let them in.

“Well, that was weird,” Diggle comments. “Maybe we should offer to collect feathers for him more often.”

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos and comment :)
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13 @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The response to last chapter was INCREDIBLE. Consider me blown away guys. You're the best readers. Thank you so much for all your support!
> 
> Once again, a massive thank you to the amazing Becky, @nvwhovian, for beta-ing. And an immense amount of thanks to Bev, @felicityollies, for making the stunning moodboard/aesthetic for BOAF shown below!
> 
> Hope you all enjoy x

* * *

* * *

Things _nearly_ go back to normal. Apart from Oliver’s more open attitude towards Felicity and Diggle, and his post-molt clinginess to the blonde, considering she was his molt companion, nothing much changes.

Felicity has to admit, she’s almost disappointed.

She thought that since Oliver was so compassionate and doting during the last two weeks (the kiss keeps coming to mind, despite her best efforts not to dwell on it), he would finally do something about this strange tension. That’s not to say that it’s the vigilante who’s to blame for this miscommunication. Felicity doesn’t make any effort to perhaps remind Oliver of all that’s happened between the two of them. That’s mostly because she’s terrified that if she does reach out to him, he’ll withdraw, and all the progress they’ve made on trust over the past month or so might be lost.

Almost a week after the molt has ended, Diggle calls Felicity frantically at 2 am on her night off from Oliver duties. Well, that’s what they’ve been calling it recently, since Oliver still isn’t fully healed and healthy enough to go back out into the field. It would be more accurate to call the nights they spend in the Foundry keeping the grounded vigilante company ‘babysitting’, but Oliver squawked angrily in protest when he heard Diggle say that.

“I have no clue what’s wrong with him, and he’s freaking me out,” Diggle says frantically down the phone, as Felicity hurriedly dresses, hopping through her apartment as she tries to yank a pair of jeans on. “He keeps snarling at me if I go near him like before when he was molting.”

“I’m coming,” she reassures him. “He’s been like a caged panther all week, he’s most likely just exercising his frustration through his claws. And that...was a really weird metaphor. Oliver’s not a panther. He’s a bird. And he’s not even really a bird. He’s like - part bird. Okay, I need to stop babbling now, I know. Can you get a bottle of the oil mixture ready for when I arrive? He always calms down during wing preening.”

“He says he wants dust.”

She frowns, her voice incredulous as she repeats, “ _Dust?_ ”

“Please get him dust before he starts throwing his flechettes at me.”

“He won’t throw his flechettes at you.”

“He’s already thrown his Rubik's, you really think he won’t throw the flechettes?”

Locking up her apartment, Felicity practically sprints for the garage. “Ask him why he needs dust.”

She can hear Diggle’s muffled voice in the background questioning the vigilante, before he comes back to her, relaying, “He says he needs to take a bath, which makes absolutely no sense to me.”

“Dust bath,” she realises. “It’s okay, Dig, I know what he needs. Tell Oliver I understand and that he just needs to wait.”

One of the websites she did her research on spoke a lot about dusting. As she clambers into her car, she quickly calls it up from her bookmarks, scanning it.

_When birds bathe in water or saturate themselves with dust they are actively maintaining their plumage. In well-watered areas bathing is most common, in arid ones dusting is more often observed. Experiments with quail show that frequent dusting helps to maintain an optimum amount of oil on the feathers. Excess plumage lipids, including preen oil after molt, are absorbed by the dust and expelled along with dry skin and other debris. If quail are prevented from dusting, their feathers quickly become oily and matted._

Well, she can’t get her hands on any dust. Why Oliver prefers dust to bathe in rather than water is a mystery to her, but she’s not about to go and suggest he change his habits just because of an unavailability of dust. Luckily, she has an idea of something they could use as a dust substitute, if the main purpose of it is to absorb excess oils.

Her car journey to the Foundry is lengthened by five minutes due to her rapid stop off at a 24-hour convenience store. Grabbing what she needs, she races to the Queen’s old steel factory and runs down into the basement just in time to stop Oliver from savagely attacking Diggle in his wild, discomfort and pain-induced state.

The vigilante has his wings fully flared, filling almost the entire length of the Foundry and he’s vibrating with energy. The two extra limbs are quivering, and the sharp lights are glinting off the silver feather tips, causing them to gleam like a pair of titanium blades attached to the bottom of his wings. He has two flechettes in each hand and his blue eyes are a touch feral as he aims to throw them. Felicity sprints down the staircase and quickly places herself in front of Diggle, who is hiding himself by holding up one of the metal trays from the medical counter as a shield.

“John, go,” she says sharply. “I’ll call you later when it’s safe for you to come back.”

“No arguments from me,” Diggle muttered, dropping the tray onto the nearest counter and making his exit as swiftly as possible.

As soon as their partner is gone, Felicity starts forwards and drops her bag from the store down onto her chair. “You know, if you keep acting like that towards Diggle, his patience is going to eventually wear thin,” she warns.

Oliver ignores that and instead demands, “Did you bring me what I asked for?”

“Okay, first of all, _manners_. You were raised in an illegal scientific facility, not by wolves. Secondly, you wanted _dust_ , Oliver. I can’t exactly go into a Walmart and ask for _dust_ , can I?” Under her breath, she adds on the end, “Although I’m sure people have asked for stranger things at Walmart.”

“So you didn’t get the dust?” he says anxiously, wings trembling and struggling to tuck in due to the feathers sliding against one another slickly. Yep, he’s definitely got an excess of preening oil.

“I got the best alternative available,” she informs him, pulling out the giant tub she bought and dropping it down onto the counter. “Talcum powder.”

“That’ll work?” Oliver questions, leaning down to gaze at the tub in concern.

“It was either this or kitty litter,” Felicity answers. “So you better _hope_ it works.”

He nods seriously, waving his hands out. “Okay. Pour it out on the floor.”

She blinks at him, and then her arms drop, the giant tub dangling from her hands as she says incredulously, “Excuse me?”

He bounces on the heels of his feet, whining, “ _Fe-li-ci-tyyyyy._ ”

“No,” she shakes her head. “No. I’m not… pouring a bucket load of talcum powder onto the floor for you to roll around in like a pig rolls around in the mud. It’s unhygienic and clean up would take _months_. Just… sit down. I’ll handle this. I’m your molt companion, this is my job.”

He looks worried. “Are you sure?”

“Oliver, I wouldn’t suggest it if I weren’t sure,” she reassures him. “And frankly, it’s in my best interest to do this, because I seriously don’t want you walking around the Foundry with dripping, oily wings for the rest of the week. Sit down.”

Settling on a chair turned around and bracing his arms on the back, Oliver leans forwards and flares his wings out with a groan. Felicity immediately sets to work, determined. She begins preening Oliver’s wings again, but this time Felicity coats her hands in the talcum powder rather than the oil mixture. She gets a strange sense of nostalgia as she pays tender attention to each feather, using talc to absorb oil and clean the barbs. The vigilante mostly remains quiet, occasionally groaning into his arms if the blonde accidentally tugs on his feathers a little too hard. Oliver lets Felicity work in silence, which she thinks she prefers, as she can focus on what her hands are doing rather than trying to work her brain to mouth filter. The silence isn’t frigid and uncomfortable, however; after spending so much time in each other’s presence, they’re relaxed and secure around one another. He stays still and motionless as well, as not to distract her. 

The dust bath takes two hours, with Felicity preening the over-sides whilst Oliver works on the undersides of his wings. There’s a couple of times where they have to migrate to the shower room and actually throw handfuls of talcum powder onto the wings, but it turns out to be a relatively easy task.

Once they’re finished, Felicity keeps the vigilante sitting in his chair for a few minutes so she can gently massage his shoulders. He’s half-asleep, his breathing even and steady, but his shoulders and back are taut and wound up. Oliver didn’t make a single sound of pain during the dust bath, but he’s obviously been in some discomfort for a while. He stirs quietly as she tries to release the tension, causing the blonde to pause and step back. She doesn’t want to startle him, and by the expression on Oliver’s face, she can tell he’s rather tired.

He stands on wobbly legs and slowly spreads his giant wings into the air. Felicity grimaces at the sight; the magnificent dark colour with the silver sparks and tips is subdued due to the whitish grey dusting of talcum powder.

That dusting doesn’t remain there for long, however, as Oliver hunches over with a sharp inhalation and gives several mighty flaps. Felicity yelps and ducks to avoid getting socked in the face by the wings, and glances up at the vigilante in awe as he continues beating the limbs powerfully, purging his feathers of the white powder. Clouds of talc buffet over her head, and the blonde has to shield her face with her hands to stop the powder from getting into her eyes.

By the time Oliver stops flapping, all of the talcum powder has been removed, leaving the beautiful dark feathers and silver tips free of the white dusting. The feathers’ iridescent shine have returned, causing them to gleam dark green. He sighs in relief, shaking his wings out one last time before tucking them comfortably. There’s no sliding of oily feathers, just a rustling and ruffling as they all shift as the wings fold in against the vigilante’s back.

“Better?” she asks gently.

“So much,” he murmurs, a serene grin spreading over his face. “Thank you so much, Felicity.”

And to her shock, he once again reaches forwards and sweeps her into a hug.

This time, Felicity instantly hugs back on instinct, burying her head underneath Oliver’s chin and resting her ear against his collarbone. His wings curl around them and their warm weight settle onto her back so she’s trapped in an Oliver-cocoon - not that she’s complaining at all. Hearing the constant thudding of his heartbeat, that reassurance that he’s here with her, he’s alive and he’s healthy, is so incredibly soothing. Felicity thinks for a second that she wouldn’t mind staying wrapped up in the vigilante’s arms forever.

Oliver doesn’t release her as he whispers into her ear, “I have something for you.”

“A present?” she perks up.

“Uh… Sort of?” He finally pulls back from her, but links their fingers together, keeping a point of connection between them that causes Felicity’s heart to flutter. “It’s not anything as amazing as the Rubik's you gave me. It’s, um… it’s actually a little more significant than that. Come on.”

Tugging her hand, the winged vigilante leads her back to her the monitor set-up and urges her to sit down in her chair. Confused but intrigued, Felicity settles when he requests her to, although she remains alert, on the edge of her seat. What gift could Oliver possibly have for her? And what exactly does he mean by it being significant? Significant for what? Whatever it is, she’s excited to find out what present he’s going to give her.

Oliver departs for only a moment, crossing the room with a spring in his step, that causes his wings to buff out, feathers ruffling. When he returns after picking something up from the back of the weapons counter, he’s almost shaking, eyes bright with a nervous, yet animated energy. Holding his breath, the winged vigilante holds out a small wooden box, offering it to her hesitantly. Felicity chews on her bottom lip, overwhelmed with curiosity as she takes the box, smoothing her thumbs over the top of it. She faintly recognises it as the rustic, dark walnut case that Oliver stores an old hunting knife in. Is he giving her his hunting knife?

“Open it,” he urges her, vibrating with his excitement.

He’s watching her with such intensity and anxiousness that she has to indulge him.

It’s not his hunting knife inside.

With nimble and delicate fingers, Felicity very carefully picks up the pure white feather that lies inside on a thin bed of red velvet by the quill, examining it. All the barbs are perfectly intact, and the feather has obviously been preened, because it seems to gleam in the light. It’s a beautiful piece of Oliver in her hand - which would probably freak Felicity out if she pondered on it further, but she quickly moves on from those sort of thoughts - and the blonde feels incredibly moved that he would give this to her.

“It’s one of my alula feathers,” Oliver murmurs. “The first one that was shed, actually. Your alula feather. Um, I don’t know if you know this, but some species of birds, they gift each other with their most precious feathers in order to present their affection for each other. Molted alula feathers are extremely rare as birds don’t often shed them, so, um… I thought…”

“Oh, Oliver,” she breathes, tucking the feather away in the velvet box. She knows she has tears in her eyes as she turns and wraps her arms around the vigilante in a fierce embrace. It’s the ultimate display of trust and friendship, him gifting her with one of his alula feathers. She’s absolutely amazed. “Thank you so much.”

“You’re accepting it?” he whispers, tucking his head into her shoulder.

Felicity pulls back so she can lightly whack him on the arm for even thinking that she might decline his deeply personal gift. “What? Of course, I am! Your feather is beautiful, and I’m touched that you’re gifting it to me.”

Oliver looks so pleased, a wide grin spreading across his face. “You’re accepting it. Felicity, thank you. I -” He pauses, seemingly speechless in his happiness.

Still beaming with joy, the winged vigilante ducks forwards and presses a gentle kiss to the blonde’s cheek, shocking her silent. He seems to lengthen it out, his lips lingering on her skin for a second or two before he slowly withdraws. Oliver’s eyes are dark and hooded with something that causes Felicity’s stomach to flutter and her to inhale sharply, swallowing as they stare at each other. She doesn’t know how to react, and it panics her. The blonde usually lets her mouth do the talking for her in these sort of situations, when she’s too flustered to get her brain to work, but she’s shaken to the core.

“We should get something to eat,” Oliver says, breaking the tension. “Big Belly Burger?”

“It’s…” She checks her phone. “It’s 4:40 am.”

“I’m hungry.”

She narrows her eyes at him. “When was the last time you ate?”

He looks guilty. “Um… I had an apple last night.”

“Yeah, okay, Big Belly Burger is a good idea,” Felicity agrees with a hasty nod, wanting this awkward moment to be over quickly. “I’ll call Dig and tell him it’s safe to come back, and to bring burgers with him.”

“No,” Oliver protests hurriedly. When the blonde shoots him a confused expression, a very light blush creeps onto his cheeks. His wings are bristling, shifting in and out due to his discomfort. “I was… kind of hoping that it could remain just us two.”

Right, because he’s more comfortable around Felicity than Diggle. He’s most likely worried that Diggle will get jealous about Oliver giving Felicity one of his alulas but not him. Felicity knows it might bother their partner a little bit initially, but he won’t mind in the long run.

“Okay,” Felicity replies, smiling. “I’ll just pop out briefly to grab us food - well, breakfast - and then come back, then.”

Oliver relaxes, nodding, and his wings jerk up with his head. “Thank you.”

Felicity ends up heading home at around six in the morning, exhausted but extremely happy. She and the winged vigilante ate semi-cold burgers and onion rings with vanilla milkshakes whilst Oliver explained what it’s like to fly. Luckily, it’s a Saturday, so she doesn’t have work and can sleep this morning to catch up on the rest she missed last night helping out the vigilante. In her tired state, the walnut box with the white alula feather ends up on her bedside table rather than her dresser as she first intended to put it. She plans to search for a display frame so she can put the feather up onto her wall, aware of how important and meaningful it is. It’s indicative of the trust that the vigilante has in her, and represents how their friendship has changed and intensified due to the molt period.

She falls asleep with Oliver’s gift on her mind, and when she awakens, it’s the first thing she sees.

It’s mid-afternoon by the time she does wake up, and it’s to a text message on her cell phone from Diggle. Detective Lance, apparently, would like to meet with Oliver tonight sometime during his patrol. According to their partner, Oliver is nervous about it, and Diggle is under the impression that it’s due to going out onto the streets with his new plumage for the first time.

Felicity understands the vigilante’s anxiety - she doesn’t particularly like going out into public when getting a new haircut, in fear of being judged. But Oliver doesn’t have anything to be worried about. He has a magnificent new pair of wings, with incredible plumage; the dark black will help him blend into the shadows, with the metallic silver tips along the edges of his wings appearing like razor sharp blades that will terrify anybody who dares to go up against him. Oliver would still like Felicity there though, on Diggle’s authority.

It’s getting dark outside when she drives over to the Foundry. When preparing her bag for the night, she for some reason found herself spurred to pick up the walnut box with the feather in it. It sits nestled in her spare sweater and pair of socks, as it can get quite cold in the dank basement at this time of year.

The blonde descends the rickety staircase into their base of operations to see Oliver has previously suited up, and is currently stretching his wings and doing some quick exercises to prepare himself for the field.

Diggle is already giving him the full-blown lecture that Felicity planned to give the vigilante. “No reckless flying. No reckless jumping off of rooftops. No getting into business that isn’t your business. No baiting or antagonising bad guys or the police. Remember that you are not fully healed yet and you are _not_ actually on duty. You’re only going out there tonight to speak with Detective Lance, and that’s it. I swear to god, Oliver, if you decide to indulge yourself in beating up some Glades gangbangers tonight when you’re not truly fit enough to even be out there in the first place -”

“We’ll pluck your wings,” Felicity interrupts him, giving the vigilante a smile that is all teeth. “Very, very slowly. Same goes for if you turn off your comms unit or ignore us.”

“You two act as if those are things I’ve done before,” Oliver grumbles, scooping up his bow with his non-dominant hand and switching it into his dominant with a skilled flick of his wrist. The bow is like an extension of his limb, and Felicity has always admired how he wields it with expert precision and confidence. “I’m not _that_ badly behaved.”

“Yes, you are,” both of them chorus.

“There was that time I told you it was stupid to try and take out five guys with only your bow when you had no cover and you ignored me,” Diggle says.

“And there was that time I told you it was too risky for you to try to catch a bad guy escaping on a motorbike who was already being chased by the police,” Felicity continues, smirking, “And you pursued him from the air anyway, and you turned your comms off.”

“Okay, so I’ve made some… slightly unreasonable decisions before.”

“I think the word you’re looking for is stupid.”

“BUT -” Oliver turns to glare at Diggle. “I’ve learnt from those illogical decisions. I won’t do that again.”

“You promise?” Felicity says, raising an eyebrow.

He smiles at her. It’s one of his genuine, warm smiles that Oliver very rarely cracks, and it’s exactly the same grin that he gave her last night when she accepted his feather gift, which causes jolts in her stomach.

“I promise,” he answers, striding past her to the side exit.

He halts briefly, to her surprise, to lean in and press a soft kiss to her cheek. On instinct, Felicity reaches out and curls her hand into Oliver’s leather jacket, which produces a strange reaction from him, where his wings jump and bristle, all the feathers fluffing out as if he’s been struck by static electricity. Oliver gives her one last smile before disappearing out into the night.

The sheer astonishment on Diggle’s face would trigger her to laugh, if she weren’t so frozen. Blinking, Felicity turns to watch the side door slam shut with a bang behind the vigilante.

“I’m so confused right now,” Diggle splutters. “Did you two get together and I missed it, or something?”

 

“Oh, no! We’re not together,” Felicity replies rapidly, and she tries desperately to squash that pang of disappointment in her chest caused by her statement. “We’re - I’m not really sure, actually. Close friends? I think the whole me helping him through the molt thing sort of brought us closer together. But not _together_ together.” She pauses. “I think.”

Diggle eyes her as if she’s gone insane. Felicity can’t bring herself to disagree with that assessment.

They don’t get to converse any longer, as Oliver comes in over the comms, which are currently linked to the monitors. Exchanging a quick glance between them, with Diggle’s informing that they will be discussing this - in depth- later, they take their places seated in front of the screens. The blonde quickly connects with the SCPD’s extensive CCTV network over the city so she can track the vigilante’s movements, whilst also hacking into the police servers so she can find out where Detective Lance is patrolling.

Relaying Lance’s location to Oliver, it doesn’t take long for the winged vigilante to track the detective down, stealthily soaring over the rooftops and crossing the distance across the Glades to the docks, where the man is on a foot patrol accompanied by a police dog and handler, according to the SCPD’s network. The harsh sound of wind blowing against Oliver’s comm unit as he glides on his massive wingspan makes Felicity wish that Oliver would wear a body cam. She can only imagine the incredible bird’s eye view the vigilante gets of Starling City, the city lights twinkling and traffic shifting on the streets far below him.

A loud thump signals Oliver’s landing, the whoosh of his wings tucking in paired with his heavy breathing sounding through the line. “Lance is with that officer around thirty feet away from me,” the vigilante reports, out of breath. “Should I approach and see if he notices me?”

“No, maintain your distance,” Diggle replies. “You don’t want that other officer seeing you and starting to shoot.”

There’s silence for a minute or two, and Felicity finds herself humming as she tries to find the dock’s cameras on the vast camera network she’s gained access to. 

“He’s seen me,” Oliver suddenly announces. “He’s sending the other officer away.”

“Alright,” Diggle says. “You’re clear to approach.”

“Wait!” Felicity calls. “Not yet. I’ve finally got CCTV. Just wait until the officer’s a bit further away so you’re out of his sight line completely. Stand by, Oliver.”

“Standing by.”

She watches the monitor closely as the grainy footage shows the dog handler walking away, and it’s only once he turns the corner that she responds, “Okay, all clear.”

“Thank you,” the vigilante replies. Both she and Diggle turn away to grab coffees, thinking everything will be fine from this point onwards, but then Oliver says, sounding panicked, “There’s some sort of creature with Lance.”

“Yeah,” Felicity answers, bemused. “It’s a dog.”

“What’s a dog?” is Oliver’s immediate reply.

Instantly, shock sweeping through her, Felicity gasps. “No. Shut up. Oliver, you have to know what a dog is.” When Oliver makes an annoyed sound, the blonde whips around to face Diggle with wide eyes, and he looks equally bewildered. “You seriously don't!? I can’t believe you don’t know what a dog is!”

“I didn’t exactly grow up in a place with these ‘dogs,’ Felicity,” the vigilante snaps.

She’s still astonished, but manages to comfort him, “Well, Lance has it on a leash so it won’t hurt you in any way. Just be careful around it.”

“Wait, it can hurt me?!” The sheer alarm in Oliver’s voice, considering it’s due to a dog, would make her laugh, if she didn’t know he’s out of his depth and pretty scared.

“It’s a canine, Oliver,” Diggle explains, remaining calm and collected despite the chuckles shaking his body. “It’s a descendant of a wolf. Do you know what wolves are?”

Felicity expects him to answer the negative, but instead, Oliver says lowly, fear clear in his tone, “There were wolves on the island. The scientists used them as guards to make sure we didn’t escape. I got mauled by one once. But that doesn’t look like a wolf at all. It’s a lot smaller.”

“And smaller equals safer,” Diggle says. “Just approach Lance. He won’t let the dog hurt you.”

“I don’t know about this.” The tremor in the vigilante’s voice breaks her heart.

“You’ll be fine,” she reassures him softly. “Just stay vigilant.”

Oliver doesn’t respond directly to them after that, and the next time he speaks, it’s in his gruff, growly vigilante tone to Lance, greeting him, “Good evening, Detective.”

“Holy shit,” is Lance’s response. “You’ve glammed those wings up. Traded the old ones in for a shiny new pair at the store?”

“No,” Oliver says, and he sounds so adorably confused. “I molted new plumage, which is why I haven’t been active over the last fortnight. I didn’t think you could get new wings at the store.”

Lance ignores his last comment, so obviously, the detective is used to Oliver’s misunderstanding of humour. “Your girlfriend said you were indisposed with an unusual injury - you trying to tell me you weren’t injured and were just dusting your wings with some soot and glitter?”

“Girlfriend?” Oliver repeats incredulously, and Felicity winces on the comms, aware that she’s going to most likely get yelled at by the vigilante when he arrives back at base. Next to her, Diggle is doubling over in laughter, so she thumps him with a scowl.

“Okay, so I gotta admit, I like the new look,” Lance continues, “But isn’t the silver a bit much?”

“It’s breeding plumage!” Diggle shouts down the line, as if hoping that the detective will be able to hear him. “Oliver, tell him it’s your breeding plumage! You’re attracting a mate to impregnate them so they can lay your eggs!”

“Shut up,” Oliver hisses to him, sounding annoyed while Felicity struggles to breathe through her laughter. “Detective, I didn’t come here for you to mock my new plumage. What do you want?”

“There’s the featherhead I know, always getting straight to business and not caring at all for jokes and teasing,” Lance mutters, making Felicity snort. “Don’t really want anything, to be honest. Your associate said on my last call that you were getting back up onto your feet, so I guess I wanted to be sure that you’re still alive so you can eventually end up in that jail cell with your name on it.”

“If I end up in a prison, you’ll be in the cell next to me for aiding and abetting as a willing accomplice,” Oliver fires back at him.

“You probably won’t end up in jail anyway,” Lance scoffs. “You’ll end up in some government lab being tested on because of those extra limbs of yours.”

Frigid silence falls. There’s a lump in Felicity’s throat that makes it hard to speak, and when she and Diggle quickly glance towards each other, they both have matching expressions of horror. Lance doesn’t know how triggering his statement is for Oliver, but judging by the winged vigilante’s hitched breathing, it’s hit home pretty hard anyway. Felicity can see on the awful CCTV footage the way that his wings tightly draw into his back and he shuffles backwards defensively, hunching over. The blonde has the sudden urge to try and comfort Oliver through their comms, but doesn’t get the chance to.

“I’d rather slit my own throat than subject myself to being an experiment again,” the vigilante says, in a threateningly quiet voice.

There’s a beat, and then Lance repeats, sounding sad and disgusted, “ _Again?_ ”

“Get that thing away from me!” Oliver suddenly exclaims, almost shouting in his agitation. 

His wings beat frantically as he backs up even further, and Felicity’s eyes switch from the flapping limbs to what’s causing his fright: the German Shepherd police dog, which has been seated behind Lance for a majority of their conversation, is pulling forwards on its leash, attempting to sniff at the vigilante curiously. Lance yanks back on the dog’s chain and it sits obediently just in front of him.

“Whoa, calm down there, angelboy,” Lance snaps. “S’just Griffin trying to get a look at you. He doesn’t bite.”

Oliver’s hesitant, but he’s starting to creep back towards the detective and his dog. “He doesn’t?”

“Well, he’s a police dog, so sure he does. He ain’t going to be biting you though. You can touch him and pet him and stuff. He won’t mind.”

Felicity smiles, resting her chin on her folded hands as she watches Oliver cautiously extend his hand towards the dog, flinching back a little bit when the dog begins snuffling his palm. After a moment, he relaxes. “Oh.”

“Ya see? Griffin’s a nice fellow.”

“He is nice. I’ve never met a dog before.”

“What? Never?!”

Oliver huffs at Lance’s disbelieving tone, falling down onto one knee and wiggling his fingers to urge the police dog closer to him. Lance drops Griffin’s leash to the ground and crosses his arms, watching with an amused expression as the German Shepherd begins sniffing the vigilante’s wings. Felicity leans back in her chair, running a hand through her hair with a wide grin on her face as she observes Oliver interacting with the dog on the monitor screen. The vigilante appears much bolder than before, stroking over the canine’s head with a look of wonder on his face whilst his wings quiver and twitch as the dog’s muzzle and whiskers brush over the feathers.

She’s fascinated by the sight of Oliver meeting a dog for the first time, which is why she squawks in protest when Diggle forcefully swivels her chair around towards him with one hand, his other turning down the audio of the comm feed and switching off their microphone. Now, they’ll be able to hear Oliver faintly, but he won’t be able to hear them.

“Dig!” she complains.

“You need to explain to me what’s going on with you and Oliver,” Diggle demands. “Because I can’t stop thinking about this, and I’m slowly being driven insane by all these different theories in my mind.”

“If you’re going crazy, then I already am,” she mutters.

“Felicity…”

“There’s nothing going on between us,” Felicity insists, “Romantically, that is.” She truly doesn’t understand why Diggle is pursuing this idea of them being together. Sure, she admitted to him that she probably wouldn’t mind being in a relationship with the vigilante, but she’s also sure she mentioned at the same time that Oliver is eternally unavailable.

“Really? Because that kiss on the cheek looked pretty damn romantic to me,” Diggle says incredulously. “Is that the only time he’s kissed you like that?” Felicity hesitates, only because she can’t bring herself to life, and the bodyguard jabs a finger at her, exclaiming, “Ha! It’s not the only time!”

“He… did it last night as well,” she confesses, blushing. “But that’s the only other time.”

“Last night,” Diggle repeats. “Okay, what happened last night before that? Why did he do it? Was there a reason?”

Felicity thinks back, remembering the events of very early this morning with a frown. Suddenly, it clicks. “I accepted his gift.”

 

Diggle’s eyes snap up to hers, staring at her with a look of urgency in his eyes as he asks quickly, “He gave you a gift? What did he give you?”

Felicity rises and hurries over to where her bag is sitting on one of the counters, ruffling through the contents until she unwraps the walnut box from her sweater. Carrying it cautiously back over to Diggle, she places it down on the metal table in front of them, exhaling. She nods, albeit reluctantly, when he silently glances towards her to ask permission to examine it. Part of her is extremely opposed to Diggle handling the feather, as it feels wrong, since it’s such an intimate present from the vigilante: literally a small piece of himself he’s entrusted Felicity with.

Just as Diggle’s fingers brush the top of the box, Oliver’s voice breaks through the speakers, announcing, “I’m coming back, guys. ETA ten minutes.”

“Roger that, bucko,” Felicity says, activating their microphone. “See you soon.”

“I’m sorry, did you just call me ‘bucko’?” Oliver says, sounding confused.

“Yep,” she replies. “See you in ten.”

“Thank you for your time, Detective,” she hears the vigilante relay to Lance.

“Dramatic little shit, aren’t you?” they hear the detective snipe in response, before static fills the speakers as Oliver takes flight, soaring away.

Felicity flicks the microphone off again just in time for her to say quietly to Diggle, “Be gentle, please,” as the man opens up the lid of the walnut box, gazing down at its contents. “That’s… valuable to me.”

Diggle nods, delicately lifting the feather up into the air. He looks intrigued, but also rather shocked as realisation streaks across his face. “Which one of his feathers is this?”

“An alula,” she responds, nervously shifting as he lowers it back down into the case.

“You accepted it from him?” Diggle asks agitatedly.

“Wha - yeah, of course. Why wouldn’t I?”

“This is very, very important, Felicity,” Diggle stresses, appearing anxious. She’s bemused - why is he so het up about this? It’s just one of Oliver’s feathers. “Did Oliver explain to you what giving you this feather meant before you accepted it?”

“He told me that it was a token of his appreciation and affection, yes.”

“And you still accepted it?”

Felicity shakes her head, aghast. “I seriously don’t see what the big deal is. It’s a feather.”

Diggle drags a hand over his face tiredly, looking shaken as he swivels around on his chair and faces one of the monitors, beginning to type on that keyboard in front of it. After a moment of clicking, he motions for Felicity to come over, sighing in concern. Worried and curious, Felicity bends over so she can read the screen, scanning her eyes over the information page that her partner has pulled up.

_Courtship displays between birds searching for mates can sometimes involve some “gifts”, from males to females. In several species, the male offers something to the female as a gesture of affection and desire to court her as a potential breeding partner. Males offer all kind of different gifts, such as flower petals, nest materials and food. Tropical species of birds have also been found to gift their potential mates with their feathers, which are produced when the male bird molts into their brighter breeding plumage._

_This behaviour is due to the male bird attempting to prove their good health, prowess and strength, as the better formed and cared for the feather, the better a mate the bird will be. This is found to be more frequent in species such as birds of genus ‘Malurus’. Once the female bird has accepted the gift from the male, she is acknowledging the male’s interest in her as a mate and is pledging that she will be receptive to the male’s other efforts of courting her._

Oh.

_SHIT._

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos and comment :)
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13, @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And we've reached the end of this fic!! It's been such an amazing journey for me, and I feel like I've massively grown as a writer. This fic was six months of work, and has been posted over a month, and I adored ever moment of it.
> 
> Thank you all so, so much for your incredible support. It has really been astounding for me, so thank you so much for everything, every kudos, message on Tumblr/Twitter and comment.
> 
> Massive thanks to Masque for allowing me to write this fic. I had a tremendous amount of fun and she's been with me every step of the way, supporting me and reading with me and helping me with the storyline. She's a godsend, I adore her, and I love her so much xx Thank you, Masque, for everything.
> 
> And an immense amount of thanks to Becky, @nvwhovian, for beta-ing this entire fic. Your little comments and messages (especially about VBAs) have made me laugh and I feel like you've helped me improv as an author. You're such a kind, beautiful soul and please know that you're one of the best people I know.
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you liked reading the fic! Your support has been incredible, and I'd really appreciate it if you could leave a comment at the end, even if you don't usually, telling me what your favourite part was, or how you enjoyed it.
> 
> Enjoy the last chapter :)

* * *

As she finishes reading, Felicity feels so confused she’s certain she’s pale as a sheet, and possibly trembling. She barely notices Diggle’s hand warily resting on her shoulder, rubbing back and forth to try and comfort her.

She doesn’t know what to think. Or say. Her thoughts are a jumbled mess in her head, and it’s as if she’s lost in a hurricane, the storm of hazy thoughts in her mind making her dizzy. She feels as if she’s about to pass out and throw up at the same time.

_She is pledging that she will be receptive to the male’s other efforts of courting her._

“He gave you his feather as a courting gift, Felicity,” Diggle says softly. “And you accepted it.”

“I - I didn’t know,” she whispers, and there’s a choking croak to her voice due to the intense wave of emotion sweeping through her. Oh god. If the feather was a courting gift… does that mean that their burger night (early morning?) was a _date?!_

She’s going to be sick.

“So you… you don’t want this?”

“No!” She feels as if she’s about to cry. Sure, she’s imagined kindling a relationship with Oliver before, but like _this_? Without her having any choice in the matter - without her even _knowing_ what was going on? “What - what do I do?”

“Sit down, sweetheart,” he murmurs, his hand squeezing her shoulder and helping her take her seat. Felicity didn’t know she was frozen in place until her legs sort of buckle beneath her as she sinks into her chair. “Now, I’m going to be honest with you, okay? I think you have two options here. You can either tell Oliver that you didn’t realise that you were agreeing to be courted when he gave you the feather, or you can sit back and let him court you and decide later on what action to take.”

She swallows, biting her lip and clenching her shaking hands. “I can’t _reject_ him, John. He - he’s opened up to me. He’ll never trust me again if I push him away. It’ll break his heart and - I can’t do that to him, Dig.”

“So you’d rather trap yourself in a courting you didn’t know about and weren’t prepared for?” he says softly. “I don’t think you realise, Felicity, that if this courting comes to fruition… you’ll be tied to Oliver as his mate. For the rest of your life.”

Her tone is fierce as she practically growls, “It won’t come to that,” but internally, she’s terrified.

What if it does come to that? She’s twenty-four years old and she’s not ready to jump into a permanent relationship. Certainly not with a reckless, damaged winged vigilante - not that there’s _anything_ wrong with Oliver _at all_. He’s perfect and amazing and incredible the way he is. Which is exactly why she’s so astounded, because _why her?_ Why has Oliver chosen her?

“So you won’t turn him down now, but you’ll end up turning him down later anyway? How does that make it any better?” Diggle questions sadly. “Aren’t you just dragging out your own pain - and leading Oliver on?”

Crap, he’s right. “I’m going to have to let him court me, aren’t I?” Felicity says finally, dejected. It’s not exactly the very worst thing ever, but it’s still not ideal. It’s going to take the blonde a while to get used to the idea of dating a broody, emotionally stunted winged vigilante… but the fact that he’s showing clear emotional growth and depth after these past few weeks spent with her helps a lot. It helps that there seems to be a mutual attraction between them as well - Felicity has to admit that Oliver is handsome, and all those days snuggled up with his half naked body did frazzle her mind slightly.

“Yeah,” Diggle sighs.

She shakes her head, turning away. “I can’t believe I was wrong,” she mutters.

“About what?”

“Oliver being eternally unavailable. When he’s in fact… actually into me.” It’s kind of like she’s trapped in some sort of strange dream. She would never have thought that Oliver could possibly want to date or court her, but here they are.

Diggle eyes her shrewdly. “You said you don’t really know if you want to have a relationship with him.”

“I did say that, yes.”

“You also said that even if you wanted to or not, it wouldn’t matter because Oliver wouldn’t want to be in a relationship.” Diggle gently taps his finger against the feather box, his smile soft and knowing. “I think this proves he’s definitely interested, Felicity. If you actually want to let him court you… you can say that. I won’t judge you for that.” He raises an eyebrow. “I will say one thing though.”

“What?” she questions, frowning.

“I told you so. I said never say never. And I called him being totally enamoured with you.”

“Fine. I’ll let you have those two,” she allows. “But only because you just calmed me down from being on the verge of a panic attack.”

The sound of the Foundry’s side door crashing open alerts them to Oliver’s arrival, as the vigilante does always like to make his dramatic entrances. It triggers them both to roll their chairs away from each other, to appear as if they were simply working on their respective, separate monitors rather than conversing.

Oliver slinks from the shadows into sight, looking rather wind-ruffled. He sheds his green hood and rakes one of his leather gloved hands through his short hair as he places his bow back onto the weapons counter. His midnight feathers are mussed and tangled, giving his usually pristinely groomed wings a dishevelled guise. It’s… somewhat attractive, actually. Felicity finds herself wincing and cringing at those thoughts, but she can’t help it. With the tousled hair and feathers and the tight leather pants and jacket… Oliver’s hot. Felicity’s a grown woman, she’s allowed to appreciate good looking guys. She shouldn’t be judged for that.

“How’d it go?” she calls over to him.

He whirls around to face them, his expression entirely serious as he announces, “We’re getting a dog.”

“No, we’re not,” Diggle says flatly.

“We have to get a dog,” Oliver insists, and there’s a whiny lilt to his voice that makes Felicity giggle and have to muffle it with her hand, because he sounds just like a nine-year-old child desperately wanting a pet.

“I don’t think we do.”

“Please, can we get a dog?”

“Ask Lance if you can borrow Griffin,” Felicity suggests.

Oliver goes quiet and his gaze flickers downwards.

Felicity sighs. “You already did and he said no, didn’t he?”

“Police dogs aren’t allowed to be rented out to vigilantes, surprisingly,” he grumbles, beginning to strip out of his leather jacket and change his sweat-soaked t-shirt, which is quite a difficult task, considering the fact that he has to manoeuvre his wings through the slits which are cut into the new shirt. This one actually is cut completely so that the tails of the fabric hang over his back, and have to be velcroed together. Felicity forces herself to avert her eyes to avoid subconsciously beginning to salivate at the sight of his bare chest. “So he said we need to get our own dog.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t think we’d be able to keep a dog down here, Oliver,” Diggle says, amusement in his tone.

“Well, maybe - maybe one of you two could get a dog and then bring it down here in the evenings?” he proposes unconvincingly.

“... I’ll think about it,” Felicity gives in, a smile on her lips.

He nods, pauses, and then says, “We could get a cat.”

“You didn’t know what a dog is, but you know what cats are?” she questions, raising an eyebrow.

Oliver rolls his eyes. “Everybody knows what cats are, Felicity. Anyway, I’d prefer a dog.”

“I’ll see what I can do for you. But for now, let’s drop the dog subject, okay?”

“Fine,” he huffs, his inner nine-year-old shining through once again as he sulks. He takes his seat on his stool and furls his wings around himself, using nimble fingers to straighten out his fingers. “Yeah, I have something else I need to ask you guys as well.”

“Go ahead,” Diggle says, as Felicity sips at her bottle of water, crossing her legs at the ankles and reclining in her seat.

“Why does Lance think that Felicity is my wife?”

Felicity chokes on her water and ends up spitting most of it out in her astonishment that the detective would actually bring that up with the vigilante. She was pretty certain earlier that Lance forgot their brief conversation entirely, but apparently not.

“Is it because I asked you to marry me the other week?” Oliver asks curiously, wings fluffing up as he gazes warmly at Felicity, a strange tenderness for her dancing in his cobalt eyes.

As soon as she stops coughing on the liquid still caught in her throat, she unleashes a drawn out groan, dropping her head onto the cold metal counter, banging it against it. “Oh my god,” she moans, but she lengthens the last word in a higher-pitched whine.

“Just FYI,” Diggle says, patting her comfortingly on the shoulder, “You never actually declined that proposal.”

Felicity just hits her head against the counter harder, hoping desperately that she’ll eventually knock herself out to escape this horrific embarrassment. However, when her brain starts to hurt, something soft slips under her forehead to cushion against the hard table. It takes a moment for the blonde to realise that it’s Oliver’s wing, that he’s angled to slide across the surface and underneath her head. The vigilante is smiling so gently at her that an overwhelming urge to lurch upwards and hug him overcomes her.

“Don’t hurt yourself,” Oliver says quietly.

“Can you do me a favor?” Felicity asks, “And knock me out by doing that weird bow punch in the face thing you can do?”

“Don’t think so,” the vigilante laughs. “I’d hate to break your nose. And I prefer you conscious.”

“You are a pain in my ass, angelboy,” Felicity informs him with a sigh, utilising Lance’s fond nickname for the vigilante, but there’s a teasing lilt to her tone that makes him chuckle. “But I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Oliver smiles brilliantly, his wings puffing out happily and giving a quick flap. Felicity’s noticed that happens whenever she says something particularly nice directed towards him. The two words ‘ _WING BONER_ ’ blare through her mind in giant red caps, but she bats them away within seconds because nope, she does not need to think about Oliver getting erections because now she’s remembering that awkward gland situation and she really doesn’t want to.

“Alright, you two,” Diggle interrupted their intense staring at each other. “Since we’re done here, I’m gonna head out.”

“Bye, John,” Felicity calls, kicking her legs back and forth in her chair as their partner collects his belongings, heading out.

Oliver echoes her sentiment, drifting closer to the blonde and setting a hand on her shoulder, gently massaging his thumb above Felicity’s collarbone. He adds thoughtfully at the end, “Thank you, Dig. See you tomorrow.”

When the vigilante’s back is turned to the man, Diggle mouths to Felicity, _TALK TO HIM_ , raising his eyebrows at her. Narrowing her eyes, the blonde sticks her tongue out playfully in response. Rolling his eyes, Diggle gives an absentminded wave and then departs from the Foundry, clunking up the staircase and exiting through the high-security door. Felicity silently wishes that he stayed, because now she’s alone with the winged vigilante; knowing that he’s attempting to court her now, after she unknowingly accepted his gift, makes her feel even more uncomfortable.

Oliver’s hand drops from her shoulder as he turns away, hopping up onto his stool and beginning to pick at his wings again. Felicity’s on auto-pilot as she stands and joins him. As she runs her fingers through the plumage to unravel clumps of midnight feathers, gently layering the twisted ones so they lie flat and in line with the others, she hesitantly says, “I hope you don’t mind, but I, um, I told Diggle about the feather gift thing.”

Oliver doesn’t react, just angling his head towards her with a slightly worried frown on his face. “I expected that you would,” he reassures her. “Just to get his opinion. What does he think about the whole me courting you deal?”

 _Shit_ , okay, so this actually is courting. They theorised before and there’d still been a tiny fragment of Felicity’s mind hoping that they were overreacting to this gift, but nope, apparently not. Oliver’s courting her. “He… was strangely cool about it.”

“Did you not expect him to be?”

“Not really,” she admits. “But he says as long as we don’t hurt each other, he’s okay with it.”

The vigilante nods pensively, and then his voice is much more concerned and wary as he questions, “And you? Are you… cool… about this?” Oliver shifts, his wing jerking in her hand, and she tuts when her fingers catch and rumple some feathers she just straightened. “Last night when I gave you the feather, I know I didn’t really _explain_ , didn’t give you much choice in the matter… I didn’t tell you about what courting involves.”

Felicity hates to agree with him, since she can tell he’s a little upset about this, but she has to. She had no idea that she agreed to a courting in the first place, but there’s no backing out now. “No, you didn’t. It… did take a while to sink in.”

His shoulders and wings slump. “Oh,” he says dejectedly.

“I appreciate that you were very excited last night so it didn’t cross your mind that your non-winged courting partner doesn’t know what courting is exactly.”

Oliver’s eyes slowly widen. He repeats, sounding shocked, “ _OH_ ,” as if in realisation.

“I think miscommunication is a major issue between the two of us,” she sighs.

“Yeah, that’s…” He swallows. “Fair enough.”

“I don’t blame you. We’re both equally at fault.” She halts, hands sunk into the vigilante’s twitching midnight feathers. “I know it might be too personal for you to answer,” she says, “But - you and Sara. Did you ever…” she trails off. She has to confess, the thought of Oliver perhaps having a courting partner before her, most likely Sara, does rub at her nerves a bit.

Oliver’s breath hitches, and his wings shudder under her touch. He stares straight ahead, past her, keeping his eyes steadily fixated on the wall. “I - I don’t think I’m ready to talk about that yet, Felicity. But when I am, you’ll be the first person I come to.” He tucks his wings in, rolling his shoulders. “It’s late.”

“It is,” she agrees. “You should get some rest, Oliver.”

“I will,” he promises her. “My nest is - right over there.” The vigilante points over to the corner. “I’ll go and sleep after I warm-down and stretch out my wings.”

“Hey, speaking of your nest,” Felicity perks up. “Now that your molt is over, does that mean I can have my hoodie and clothes back?”

Oliver doesn’t even hesitate, brushing dust and grit from his feathers, that’s collected there when flying through the city, from his sides and front. “No. Sorry.”

“Why not?” Felicity complains.

Shrugging, the vigilante explains rather lamely with only six words, but those six words tear into her heart. “Nest smells like you. It’s comforting.”

“Oh, Oliver,” she murmurs, trying to will back the tears of emotion in her eyes, and failing. The vigilante is soothed by the scent of her clothes. She can’t very well disrupt his rest and sleep by taking them away, can she?

Sensing her confliction, Oliver reaches over to briefly squeeze her fingers in consolation. Felicity’s breath stutters and she clasps his hand tightly in response, smiling. After a moment, Oliver draws away and makes a beeline for his nest, a strange skip in his step that causes his wings to flutter. It’s kind of adorable seeing his wings give a little flap like that to support his balance, like seeing a toddler spreading out his arms to reduce his wobbling.

“You can have this,” he offers, returning with a pool of dark green fabric in his hands.

She lights up, making grabby hands for it. It’s her favourite hoodie, one of the ones Oliver stole for his nest, but it’s especially important to her as it’s the one that she sleeps in when it gets cold in her apartment. Recently, she’s been wearing it around the Foundry, drinking hot cocoa in it when Oliver goes out on his patrols. She’s missed it for the last two weeks. “Yay! Hoodie!”

“You should be grateful I’m giving this back to you,” Oliver teases her, crossing his arms. “That’s my favourite one of yours.”

She grins. “It’s my favourite too.”

He nods, smiling. “You’re - um - you’re not getting any of your other clothes back, by the way.”

“Hey, I’m happy. I got my favourite hoodie back.” She lifts the fleece fabric to her face and inhales, pleasure washing over her at the distinct scent of Oliver: sweat, musky pine, a sort of fresh rain, and a hint of chalk - although that last one might have been because of the talcum powder they used this morning. Oh yes, she’s definitely going to be sleeping in this hoodie tonight. And that… sounds vaguely creepy. It’s just a very soothing scent. For a second, she wonders what she smells like, for Oliver to have been comforted by own scent. “You’re forgiven, mister; you can keep the rest of the clothes.”

“Thank you,” he bobs his head happily.

“Yeah, can I give this back to you in like a month so you can sleep with it again?”

“Why?”

“No reason,” she says innocently, pulling it on over her head and snuggling into it. Once Oliver’s scent wears away from her sleeping in the hoodie, she’s going to want him to renew it.

The vigilante narrows his eyes suspiciously at her, his wings quivering. “There’s a reason and you’re not going to tell me, are you?”

“Nope.” She pops the ‘p’, grinning widely at him.

Oliver hops up onto the stool in front of his weapons counter. His wings jump with his movement, giving two little flaps to help him balance. Felicity is mesmerised by the shimmer of the dark, emerald green feathers and the glint of the sparks of silver, staring at them. She has to swallow the lump that forms in her throat and force herself to turn away.

“How about we play a game?” he suggests.

“A game?” Felicity repeats curiously. She swings herself into her swivelly chair, resting her arms on the back of it. “What kind of game?”

“We exchange a truth for a truth,” the vigilante explains, “About something important, or something we think the other should know. No judgement. Stays in the room and doesn’t have to ever be discussed again.”

Felicity narrows her eyes, but eventually shrugs. What harm could this little game possibly do? “Okay. You wanna go first?”

“Yep,” Oliver nods. “My wings aren’t actually thirty feet in span.”

Blinking, surprised, she questions, “How big are they then?”

He grins. “Thirty point two.”

She would whack him with a pillow if one was in reach, so instead, she just snatches up one of the empty plastic cups from underneath her workstation and chucks it at his head. “Jackass.”

“No, no, I’m kidding, that’s not actually my truth,” he reassures. “My truth is that I might have had other reasons apart from my instincts for wanting Diggle out of the Foundry during my molt.”

“Like an ulterior motive?” At the vigilante’s nod, Felicity leans forwards, intrigued. “Go on.”

He exhales slowly, before admitting rather sheepishly, “It… _might_ have been to do with wanting to be alone with you.”

Felicity feels her eyes widening. Her mouth feels very dry suddenly as she squeaks out, “ _Oh_ ,” in faint shock. Before she can properly process this, however, Oliver motions at her for speak, shuffling on his stool expectantly. “Um… uh… the… reason I want you to sleep with my hoodie again in a month or two is that I want it to smell like you.”

She blushes immediately, but to her surprise, Oliver straightens and his wings jerk, a brilliant smile spreading across his face. “Really?” When she manages to bob her head in a nod, the vigilante preens happily. “Okay, well, my second truth is that… um…” He pauses, suddenly cautious. “Dig was… right. This - this is my breeding plumage.” He fans his wings out, appearing embarrassed.

Felicity smiles at him sympathetically. “Yeah, I kinda worked that out, Oliver.”

“Right,” he nods. “But what you don’t know is that my breeding plumage changes each year. The colours are… always different. Last time I got my breeding plumage, my wings were almost completely white, with some brown primaries.”

“How come it changes?” she asks, intrigued.

He goes red. “Ummm.”

“Come on, you’ve gotta tell me now. You can’t leave me in suspense.”

The vigilante shakes his head. “Please don’t laugh,” he pleads quietly. “My… breeding plumage colours are determined by pheromones and hormones. And those levels are affected by what my psyche thinks would most please the specific courting partner I’m trying to attract at the time.”

It takes a moment for Felicity to process, but once she ultimately realises what Oliver is saying, she can feel her cheeks heating up and hands becoming sweaty. “That’s why you were so happy at my reaction to them.”

Shrugging, and his wings shrugging with him, Oliver admits, “I was kind of worried when I first saw the plumage after showering, because usually, it’s a lot… brighter.”

“For attracting a mate,” the blonde asserts. “But I think the silver compensates for the darkness. I _love_ the new plumage, Oliver.”

He does perk up slightly at that. “Your opinion is the only one that matters,” he murmurs, glancing down at the ground with a shy smile.

“My turn!” Felicity chirps.

“No, can - can I do another one?”

She blinks. “Uh. Sure?”

“I just wanna say this aloud before I lose my courage.” Hunching his shoulders, Oliver continues in a quiet, hesitant voice. “I… I had a dream about kissing you.”

Felicity freezes.

“It was during the molt and we were having this emotional conversation in the dream and I know it sounds really weird, and kinda creepy, but I just -”

“Oliver, it wasn’t a dream,” she interrupts.

A bewildered expression sweeps over his face. “No. It - what are you saying?”

Her voice trembling, Felicity repeats slowly, “It. Wasn’t. A. Dream.”

They stare at each other, Felicity in slight fear and Oliver in utter astonishment. As soon as he seems to process her words, the vigilante exhales sharply and his tensed wings snap into his back, quivering and bristling. His eyes flash down at the floor and he gapes, struggling in silence to find words to respond with, starting to shake. Gulping, Felicity stands and slips over to him, her strides guarded and careful as she approaches the rattled vigilante.

As she hesitantly rests her hand on Oliver’s shoulder, he barely startles, just raising his head and whispering, “I thought it was a dream.”

There are tears in his eyes that cause her heart to clench. Wiping them away with nimble, gentle fingers, Felicity murmurs back, “It was real.”

“I’m so sorry -”

“No, don’t - don’t apologise.”

“But I -” He shudders. “I did it without your consent and -”

“Oliver,” she cuts in firmly. “It’s alright. Don’t feel sorry about it, please. Honestly, I’ve done much worse than kissed somebody unexpectedly. If I'm going to be honest - I liked it. I enjoyed it. I wouldn't regret it for a single moment."

The vigilante sniffles and nods, scrubbing at his eyes. "I'm really happy to hear that," he whispers, managing a wobbly smile.

Steeling herself, Felicity says seriously, “Okay, time for my truth. Oliver, I tried to milk your uropygial gland so I could groom your wings with your own preening oil. I didn’t realise it was a such a… sensitive area on your body and you reacted physically to it.”

He doesn’t speak for a moment, fixing piercing blue eyes onto her that make Felicity feel naked and exposed before him. Eventually, he breaks the silence. “I know.”

She startles. “You… know?”

“I was awake,” he mutters.

Horrified guilt crashes into her like a tidal wave, and Felicity claps a hand to her mouth to stifle her gasp, which is mingled with a sob. Oliver was awake. Oliver _knew she had sexually violated him_. “Why didn’t you tell me you were awake?!” she cries. “Why didn’t you tell me to stop?!”

Oliver grabs her wrists, and drags them down from where they’re covering her face in embarrassment and dismay. “Because I didn’t want you to.”

There’s a tense beat between them.

“You were upset afterwards,” Oliver carries on. “And I thought - you regretted it, so I decided I wouldn’t ever bring it up again. But we said this was a no judgement zone and wouldn’t leave the room and I thought you should know!”

“Of course I was upset! Oliver, I essentially sexually violated you! ”

“You didn’t,” he says, shrugging and frowning down at the floor. “I didn’t stop you.”

“I thought you were unconscious,” she grits out.

“I wasn’t.”

“Well yes, I know that now!”

“Felicity, look, that wasn’t the first time you gave me an erection by accident, so I don’t think -”

“Excuse me?” she practically shrieks.

He flails his hands, motioning up and down her body. “You’re - you’re _you_.”

“And?!”

Oliver blushes. “And sometimes you wear these really short skirts and yoga pants that are probably tighter than they should be and - I have wings but I’m still a member of the male human species, okay?! I have these sort of reactions towards attractive women. Specifically, towards you. Especially when you’re touching my wings. Because it’s - it’s not just the glands that are sensitive.”

“Oh my god,” she mouths, astounded that this is where their little game of truth exchange has gotten them.

“I shouldn’t have said anything,” Oliver shakes his head. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you telling me that every time I was grooming your wings, I was feeling you up?” Felicity asks, her eyes stinging a little bit due to how wide she’s held them, not blinking, over the last minute. “Oh my god, that’s why you didn’t want Diggle touching them.”

“... and usually we don’t let anybody other than potential partners touch our wings…”

“The wing preening was a courting thing too!? Seriously?!”

“It just indicates a bond of trust,” he insists. “It only would have reached a courting stage if we started allopreening and I groomed your wings back. But you don’t have any wings and it would have been strange for me to try and brush your hair so -”

“Okay, little too much truth, Oliver,” she whispers. “Dial back on the truth, please. I think I preferred it when you were being secretive.”

He grumbles under his breath, turning sideways so he can pick at the silver speckled feathers in his wings. “We’ll be doing worst things in the future so I don’t know why you’re making such a fuss about this.”

Felicity gazes at him aghastly for a second, unable to believe what she’s hearing. “I can’t believe you just said that.”

Oliver gives her a small smile, lips quirking upwards as he trails his fingers down the forearm he’s still grasping securely, informing her in a husky, deep tone, “You’re very beautiful, Felicity. I’m not going to deny that I’m going to want you in a more physical way in the future.”

She’s pretty sure she’s managing an excellent deer in the headlights expression.

“No, wait, that was too forward,” Oliver realises, flushing crimson in his cheeks again. “Sorry.”

“Wow,” she says shortly.

“Sorry! Sorry.”

“How about we put this entire conversation on the back burner for now. Establish a mutual understanding that we kissed, I sort of gave you a boner and leave it there.” Oliver bows his head in acceptance of these conditions, finally allowing Felicity to relax. She pauses thoughtfully, and then points at his wings. “With this courting between us, nobody else touches those except me, capeesh?”

“I am all yours,” he promises.

Stroking her fingertips down the feathers has an entirely different new meaning now, and Felicity feels heat pool in her gut as Oliver shudders, his eyes slipping shut. “You mean this -” Felicity waves her hands vaguely, gesturing to his body. “I get all this, to myself?”

“Yep,” he nods.

She narrows her eyes at him. “Does this mean that you’re going to be walking around the Foundry shirtless more?”

“I mean, I can have that arranged,” Oliver offers.

“Yes, please,” she hastily agrees.

He leans in and whispers, “As long as I get to see you shirtless in the Foundry too.”

Felicity snickers and playfully pushes him away. “I don’t think Dig would appreciate that, mister.”

“He doesn’t mind me shirtless, so why should he mind you shirtless?”

“Because I have breasts, and beasts tend to make men uncomfortable if they’re not actively lusting after the woman. And Diggle is like my big brother so I’m pretty certain that in his mind I don’t have breasts at all and I don’t have any sort of sex life.”

“Well, that’s illogical and stupid,” Oliver says. “But you know what wouldn’t be illogical and stupid?”

“What?”

“Getting a dog.”

“Okay, I’m leaving before you start going on about this adopting a dog thing again. Goodnight,” she sing-songs, grabbing her bag and skipping for the exit.

“Don’t I get my goodnight kiss?”

Felicity freezes.

_Goodnight kiss._

_WHAT THE FUCK._

She can’t do anything except stammer, “Er…”, feeling as if the world has come to a standstill around her, all the air being sucked out of the room. Felicity suddenly feels very small, put on the spot, and suddenly she’s shaking, eyes wide and astonished as she stares at Oliver, shocked.

The vigilante puts her out of her misery quickly, but instead of breaking the ice with a snarky comment or apologising for making her uncomfortable, he just swoops up to her, gently tilts her chin up with one finger, and presses his lips to hers in a tender, loving kiss. Felicity’s mind completely whites out, numbness sweeping through her, leaving her motionless and unresponsive. It takes her a second to realise that Oliver is kissing her, _holy shit he’s kissing her AGAIN_ , and then she melts.

She falls into his embrace, sinking her hands into his trembling, shivering wings. The kiss is warm and soft just like before, but now, she can properly enjoy it. She knows that the vigilante isn’t delirious and out of his mind; he’s doing this because he _wants_ to, and he seems to be _enjoying_ it. And she’s enjoying it as well. Really enjoying it.

Oliver breaks the kiss, glancing upwards with a smile. Felicity untangles her fingers from his black feathers, which are now massively fluffed up and bristling. Her lips feel swollen and she knows she’s blushing, because her face feels flushed with heat, her heart thudding in her chest rapidly due to the adrenalin coursing through her system. God, that was amazing.

Maybe this courting thing is going to work out after all.

“Goodnight, Felicity,” Oliver murmurs, dotting one last kiss on her forehead.

“‘Night,” she replies, voice strangled.

“Oh, and before I forget.” He reached behind her and when he reveals what he’s picked up, he’s holding the completed octahedron Rubik's in his hand, offering it to her. “I thought maybe you’d like to take a go at solving it.” He smiles softly. “It… helped me out a lot when I was struggling with my thoughts. It helped me focus enough to realise a few things and - well, I wouldn’t be in the position I am now without it.”

He sets the puzzle gently into her hand, and despite the fact that Felicity knows it hardly weighs anything, it feels like a boulder weighing her arm down. As she watches him saunter away from her, she can’t help but wonder whether or not goodnight kisses are going to be a consistent thing between the two of them now. Because she’s pretty sure she could get addicted to them.

Felicity _definitely_ doesn’t go home in a daze after that and end up spending the rest of the night cuddled in bed with the feather box and octahedron Rubik's, wearing her hoodie that smells like Oliver.

She also _definitely_ doesn’t dream of a certain winged vigilante sweeping her off her feet and flying with her held bridal style into the sunset.

Who’s she kidding?

She’s a goner.

And it looks like Oliver is too.

* * *

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for reading, and I hope you liked reading the fic! Your support has been incredible, and I'd really appreciate it if you could leave a comment, even if you don't usually, telling me what your favourite part was, or how you enjoyed it :)
> 
> Tumblr: @alexiablackbriar13, @thatmasquedgirl  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos and comment :)
> 
> Tumblr: @thatmasquedgirl, @alexiablackbriar13  
> Twitter: @lexiblackbriar


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